Martin Eberhard, one of Tesla’s co-founders, said his relationship with Elon Musk has soured to the point that he now avoids all news about the billionaire, according to Business Insider US.
Musk and Eberhard worked together at Tesla for a three-year period ending in 2007. Eberhard said he and Musk were ‘congenial’ until his last few months at the company. At the time, Eberhard was serving as CEO, while Musk was an investor and board member.
‘His behaviour changed dramatically as soon as we started having press about Tesla. He got mad if anything was ever written about Tesla and it didn’t feature his name prominently. And that’s when I realised that there was an ego involved here that I hadn’t recognised before.’
As CEO, Eberhard briefly became the face of Tesla. He was dubbed “Mr Tesla” in articles, and publicly introduced the Tesla Roadster to California’s then governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Eberhard said that Musk would call and ‘scream’ at him if he saw an article that didn’t include Musk and cite his role as Tesla’s largest investor.
A book by The Wall Street Journal‘s Tim Higgins said Musk threatened to fire a public-relations firm in 2006 over a New York Times story on Tesla that did not mention Musk.
Musk said that Eberhard’s departure was related to delays in the Tesla Roadster’s production and other operational issues. Eberhard said he resigned.
Now he tries to avoid news of Musk, whose name has become virtually synonymous with Tesla.
‘Honestly, I have Elon Musk blocked in my newsfeed’, Eberhard said. ‘I don’t need to read any more about him.’
[Photo: Getty Images]