How Elon Musk took over Tesla using money, strong-arm tactics, and his own popularity

Tesla co-founder Martin Eberhard and Elon Musk at the launch of the Tesla Roadster in 2008. | Image: GettyThe story of Tesla and Elon Musk can be traced back to the early 2000s, when Musk was ousted as CEO of his first company, PayPal. That incident taught Musk a crucial lesson about the importance of being in control, even when it wasn’t your own company.
In episode two of Land of the Giants: The Tesla Shock Wave, we talk to Tesla’s original co-founders, Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning, as well as several of the company’s earliest employees, to tell what is essentially an origin of the electric automaker — but also of Musk himself. We learn how Musk was brought on as a crucial early investor but soon used his clout, money, and even a few strong-arm tactics to oust Eberhard and Tarpenning and eventually install himself as CEO of Tesla.
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