American automobile maker Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) has recently lost another member of its senior management this time the leader of the team working on its self-driving technology Chris Lattner after working with the company for just six months. Despite this, the company is said to be currently working on an agreement that would allow the company to build a vehicle factory in China. A plan which has been announced by the company earlier this year as it moves forward to meet the rising demand for its electric vehicles.
New Autopilot Team Head
After former Autopilot software chief Chris Lattner tweeted that he has left the company and was confirmed later by Tesla in a statement. In Lattner’s tweet, he stated that working for Tesla was not the right for him and stated that he is interested in looking for other roles as a seasoned engineering leader.
The company has announced that the position will be filled by Andrej Karpathy who will also serve as the company’s Autopilot vision and artificial intelligence director along with current Tesla hardware division chief Jim Keller. Tesla then mirrored Lattner’s tweet and stated that Lattner was not the right person for Tesla attributing to the changes in the Autopilot leadership.
Karpathy is known for his wide background in deep learning and being an Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Inc veteran. He has also worked previously as a research scientist at OpenAl which happens to be an Elon Musk-backed non-profit research company. Tesla describes him as one of the world’s leading experts in computer vision and deep learning.
Tesla which is known for its vision in self-driving and electric cars suffered a few setbacks last year with the launch of its autopilot system. Despite those, the demand for autonomous driving systems from Tesla, in particular, has remained high as safety regulators announced that the recent accidents were not to be blamed on Tesla.
Tesla Factory In China
Following a surprising rise in Tesla sales in China a few months ago, the company is now reportedly working on a deal to build a factory in China despite confining its production in the United States alone for the past couple of years.
Just this March, the Palo Alto-based company delivered earnings of $1.06 billion in China compared to their $300 million earnings in 2015 making China the company’s second largest market next to the U.S.
According to the reports, Tesla is close to striking an agreement with Shanghai to manufacture and produce its vehicles in the country which would expand their vehicles to the largest car market along with the Chinese government looking to see more energy vehicles on its highways.
Tesla shares jumped by around 2% close to a 52-week high on Tuesday following the reports despite not being confirmed by the company.