Huawei executive loses job over controversial Tesla claims

A senior official of Huawei Technologies' car business unit has been removed from his position after he claimed Tesla vehicles are "killing" people, causing a storm of reaction in the industry and social media.

Su Qing, head of autonomous driving at Huawei, was removed from his position after making "improper remarks in public." Su is now in the reserve team for training and distribution, Huawei said. 

Su told a panel at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference 2021, held in Shanghai earlier this month, that Tesla has a "very high accident rate," which made cars sometimes "kill" people.

His claims were hotly debated in media and on social networks.

They raised unnecessary public concerns about the automotive driving sector that may hurt the whole industry, including Tesla, and even Huawei, said industry insiders. 

Tesla was not available to make comment on the issue on Wednesday. 

China is the fastest-growing automotive driving market, with many new and competitive players, including Huawei, Tencent, Alibaba and Xiaomi.