Photo: Jeff Roberts
Tesla’s Tom Zhu, the head of the Gigafactory in Shanghai, has been traveling in the U.S. along with a team of aides to help improve production at the automaker’s Fremont and Austin factories, according to a report from Reuters.
The news comes just weeks after reports first suggested that Zhu would be heading to Giga Texas to help with the Model Y’s production ramp-up.
Talk is surfacing that Zhu is being groomed by CEO Elon Musk for a larger role at the company, following the executive’s work heading the company’s operations in Asia.
Zhu’s team includes Giga Shanghai manager Song Gang, and the two of them will be traveling with a team to both Giga Fremont and Giga Texas, working at both plants as recently as last week, according to two sources familiar with the matter.
The sources requested anonymity as they are not authorized to discuss these topics with the media.
Last week, when Tesla shared an image of the Giga Texas team on Twitter, announcing the milestone of 3,000 Model Y builds per week, Zhu and his team were spotted on the far left.
Giga Texas hits 3k Model Y builds/week.
Congrats, Tesla team! 🤘 pic.twitter.com/uhG03gFyba
— Tesla (@Tesla) December 15, 2022
Congrats to the Tesla Giga Texas team, and to Tom Zhu who was smiling in the crowd, you guys are awesome. pic.twitter.com/WtN0SQiACL
— Chris Zheng (@ChrisZheng001) December 16, 2022
Zhu also traveled to the U.S. in August for Tesla, according to one of the sources, during a time when the automaker had unfilled management roles.
The two people also said Zhu may be in line for a more high-profile role, while a farewell poem from a close aide with Zhu surfaced in recent weeks to seemingly corroborate the claims.
