Are intensifying Tesla safety recalls a symptom of a leadership vacuum?

The news: Recent safety recalls on Tesla Model X, Model Y, and Model 3 vehicles could be  symptoms of its preoccupied leadership and expose the danger of hyperscaling production per PCMag.

Recalls mount while Musk is away:

  • Tesla has issued a recall for over 300,000 EVs in the US due to a taillight problem where tail lamps “may intermittently illuminate due to a firmware anomaly.”
  • Last week, Tesla recalled 29,000 Model X vehicles for faulty front-passenger airbags that could deploy “in an unwanted configuration during certain low-speed collision events.”
  • Before that, Tesla recalled 1,000 vehicles in Australia due to a steering system defect where electronic-assist steering could lose power, per Insider

You can’t autopilot passenger safety: Tesla has filed 19 recall campaigns this year, covering over 3.7 million vehicles, per Sky News.

  • Hyperscaling EV production complicates quality testing and results in QA problems being discovered when thousands of affected vehicles are already being used by customers—which increases the possibility for accidents.
  • Software updates introduce new problems. For example, Tesla recalled 40,000 Model S and Model X vehicles November 1 after a software update caused power steering to malfunction.

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