Tesla's Autopilot Hardware Chief Joins Amazon's Self-Driving Revolution: What's Behind the Move?

Tesla has seen the departure of Zheng Gao, its long-time head of Autopilot hardware engineering, who has joined Amazon's self-driving subsidiary, Zoox. Gao, who dedicated over eight years to Tesla, spent the last three leading teams responsible for the hardware behind Tesla's Autopilot and Full Self-Driving (FSD) systems.

On his LinkedIn profile, Gao detailed his leadership over key engineering teams, including Mechanical, Thermal, Display, and Camera Engineering, focused on low-voltage electronic systems. His tenure at Tesla followed a decade at Apple, where he contributed to numerous groundbreaking electronic designs.

Zoox has confirmed Gao's appointment to a senior engineering leadership role, signaling its ambition to strengthen its self-driving capabilities. The move comes at a pivotal moment for Tesla, as the company asserts that unsupervised self-driving technology is on the horizon—a claim CEO Elon Musk has reiterated annually for the past six years.

Meanwhile, Zoox has made notable strides, including improving its test performance in California and launching its robotaxi service in San Francisco.

Analysis

While Gao’s departure might reflect routine career transitions, it raises questions about his belief in Tesla's vision of achieving fully autonomous driving. Leaving at such a critical juncture could suggest skepticism about Tesla’s ambitious claims or simply a pursuit of fresh challenges at Zoox, which continues to make impressive advancements in autonomous vehicle technology.