Tesla eyes internal CEO candidates if Musk steps down over pay vote, Bloomberg News reports

(Reuters) -Tesla is looking at internal CEO candidates if Elon Musk leaves in case the $1 trillion pay plan is not passed at the annual shareholder meeting next week, Bloomberg News reported on Tuesday, citing the automaker's board chair. Chair Robyn Denholm had urged shareholders on Monday to vote for the proposed CEO compensation package, seeking to keep the world's richest person at the helm of Tesla as the company pivots to focus on self-driving technologies and human-like robots. The development underscores how central Musk remains to Tesla's identity and investor confidence, even as it faces pressure to reduce dependence on him. Tesla did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. The proposed pay package would grant Musk 12 tranches of stock options tied to lofty targets, including a market capitalization of $8.5 trillion and ambitious milestones in autonomous driving and robotics. A string of senior departures over the last few years has left Tesla with a shallow management bench, where Chief Financial Officer Vaibhav Taneja and Senior Vice President of Automotive Tom Zhu are now the most prominent executives after Musk. (Reporting by Akash Sriram in Bengaluru; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar)

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