Tesla’s top crash safety architect quits

Tesla’s top crash safety architect, who helped the automaker achieve top safety scores for its entire car line-up, announced that he is leaving the automaker after 14 years.

We are talking about Petter Winberg, Tesla’s Principal Engineer for CAE crashing safety for the last decade.

After an extensive career at Volvo and SAAB, both car brands praised for their commitment to safety, Winberg joined Tesla in 2011 to work on the “crash safety development of Model S structure and side occupant restraints.”

At the time, Tesla was still working on the Model S, its first vehicle built entirely from the ground up, considering the original Roadster was based on the Lotus Elise.

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CEO Elon Musk aimed for “Tesla vehicles to be the safest on the planet,” and Winberg took the challenge seriously.

He led the development of the vehicle body and chassis structure for Model 3 and Model Y, as well as the crash structure for Model S and Model X.

All of these vehicles have received top safety crash scores from independent testers worldwide – quickly elevating Tesla’s brand into a leader in passive safety.

Winberg and his team deserve a lot of the credit for this.

The engineer also led the design of crash readiness and the energy-absorbing capacity of Tesla’s latest “gigacasting” and structural battery pack designs, for which he obtained patents. Other automakers have since adopted similar designs.

For those less technical who want to understand how good and respected Winberg is at Tesla, he has been working for Tesla remotely in Sweden for the last five years. That’s impressive in itself, considering how much Musk hates remote work. He previously emailed Tesla management to tell them that only exceptional employees would be eligible for an exemption to work remotely, which he would approve himself.

After 14 years at Tesla, Winberg announced last week that he is leaving (via LinkedIn):

Having developed Model S, S-DM, X, 3, Y, Y-SP as well as future crash architectures, I have decided now is the time to move on. Thank you Tesla, keep crushing it! What an incredible team, I will miss you all.

He didn’t elaborate on his reasons for leaving the automaker or announce another venture.

Electrek’s Take

While Tesla has received much criticism for the dangers of its Autopilot and “Full Self-Driving” systems, I don’t think anyone can question that Tesla vehicles perform extremely well in terms of passive safety.

Independent testing has proven it time and time again.

Tesla has led the way in taking advantage of designing electric vehicles from the ground up. Its skateboard-like powertrain design and lack of engine in the front allow for a giant crumple zone to absorb the energy in case of a crash.

A big thank you to Petter Winberg for his designs and leadership in improving Tesla’s passive safety. He has undoubtedly made the automotive industry safer and saved lives. Congratulations.

As for his departure, it’s certainly a blow for Tesla. As we previously reported, the company has suffered a significant exodus of talent over the last year, with a big part of its leadership leaving during and after a wave of layoffs last year.

Many predict that Tesla could again initiate another wave of layoffs in the coming months as its sales are crumbling worldwide.