Tesla's Optimus humanoid robot program head exiting firm, Bloomberg News reports
(Reuters) -The head of Tesla's Optimus program, Milan Kovac, is leaving the company, casting uncertainty over chief executive Elon Musk's humanoid robot project, Bloomberg News reported on Friday, citing a person familiar with the matter.
Kovac, vice president and head of engineering for Optimus, told colleagues on Friday that he was departing, effective immediately. Ashok Elluswamy, who leads Tesla's autopilot teams, will take on Kovac's role, the report said.
Tesla, Kovac and Elluswamy did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment.
Musk has earlier said he expected Tesla to make thousands of Optimus robots this year.
He said in April that China's export restrictions on rare-earth magnets had affected production of the humanoid robots.
Tesla has shifted focus to launching the robots and its robotaxi service, with much of the company's valuation hanging on that bet.
"The only things that matter in the long term are autonomy and Optimus," Musk told CNBC in an interview in May.
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Commissioner Marty Makary recently unveiled a framework for approving updated Covid vaccines that sets study expectations for manufacturers who want to get their shots approved for young, healthy people. The agency green-lit the company's first clinical trial in humans in 2023. — Lauren Gardner The Trump-Musk breakup comes as Congress is considering legislation that would regulate cryptocurrencies. Musk — a longtime fan of the industry and particularly the token Dogecoin — isn't explicitly in the crypto business. But his social media company's plan to launch an 'X money' platform with Visa has sparked concerns among some lawmakers that he or another big technology firm could seek to issue a digital currency known as a stablecoin that is pegged to the value of the dollar. Lawmakers could include language in crypto legislation that would limit tech firms' ability to use stablecoins to get into financial services. That would allay fears from Democrats about digital currencies breaking down historic barriers between banking and commerce firms — but it would deliver a blow to Musk. What's more, X's payments company is poised to operate as a money transmitter business that is regulated by the Treasury Department. The company has already obtained licenses in several dozen states and has registered with Treasury's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network. — Jasper Goodman and Michael Stratford Trump's environmental regulators also have the power to obstruct one of Musk's highest-profile initiatives — his artificial intelligence company, xAI. The Memphis, Tennessee-based supercomputer behind Musk's chatbot, Grok, has a voracious appetite for electricity, and has been powered in part by natural gas turbines operating without Clean Air Act permits since June 2024. The Environmental Protection Agency has so far declined to take any action against the sprawling supercomputer facility for the huge amounts of smog-forming air pollution it's releasing. Theoretically, though, it could order xAI to shut the unpermitted turbines down. If that happens, Grok would be forced to operate on just 150 megawatts of power that xAI receives from the local electric grid — a fraction of what it needs. Musk has underscored the importance of the turbines to his operations, saying at the launch of Grok3 in February that the bot was powered by 'trailer after trailer of generators.' xAI was valued at $80 billion in March when it bought Musk's social media site X. xAI is now seeking a Clean Air Act permit for 15 of the turbines. The decision technically lies with the Shelby County Health Department, but the department has requested assistance from EPA, which is reviewing the issue. EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin met with xAI representatives at the end of May. — Ariel Wittenberg
