"We have done a thorough review of the organisation and made the difficult decision to reduce our headcount by more than 10% globally," said the email from Musk as quoted by BBC.

"There is nothing I hate more, but it must be done. This will enable us to be lean, innovative and hungry for the next growth phase cycle," he said.

A Tesla employee who had been told he was being let go told the BBC he had subsequently been locked out of his emails, as had all other staff being laid off.

Andrew Baglino, Tesla’s senior vice president for energy engineering and powertrain, said he has decided to move out of the company after serving it for 18 years.

"I made the difficult decision to move on from Tesla after 18 years yesterday. I am so thankful to have worked with and learned from the countless incredibly talented people at Tesla over the years," he wrote on X.

"I loved tackling nearly every problem we solved as a team and feel gratified to have contributed to the mission of accelerating the transition to sustainable energy, a mission that I am quite passionate about," he said.

He said: "I will always have a warm spot for the people of Tesla and Tesla products in my heart and wish the team and company the best in the future. When I joined as a junior firmware / electrical engineer back in 2006, a future Tesla that produced the world’s top selling vehicle was well beyond my expected set of outcomes. A reminder to all of us to set higher expectations, I guess :)"