Tesla Motors sidesteps former CEO's lawsuit

Cleantech's most litigious startup Tesla Motors is likely celebrating today, after reports surfaced that a judge dismissed a lawsuit brought by the company's former CEO.

Martin Eberhard sought in the lawsuit to be named as one of the company's founders, accusing the electric carmaker and current CEO Elon Musk of slander, libel, breach of contract and other complaints (see Former CEO goes after Tesla, Musk). Eberhard complained that he was “pushed out of the company he founded” when Ze’ev Drori took over in 2007, only to be succeeded the following year by Musk (see Eberhard out, Drori in at Tesla).

“Musk has persistently and continuously made defamatory, disparaging, negative and harmful statements about Eberhard within Tesla Motors and in public forums such as electronic media, newspapers, websites and blogs,” the lawsuit said.

Musk didn't take the accusations lightly, responding with a 7,000-word blog post that included email exchanges with investors, employees, a blogger, and other business partners to accuse Eberhard of a series of missteps that resulted in near-devastating cost overruns in the company's early days (see Elon Musk strikes back at former Tesla CEO).

Musk also said Eberhard brought no technology, prototypes or intellectual property related to electric cars to Tesla. As for the work he did at the company: "Three years later, when Eberhard was asked to leave Tesla, most of the work that he had been paid to do had to be redone," Musk wrote. 

Of course there were court filings, too, but those weren't as much fun to read.

Sadly, the back-and-forth is over for now, as Eberhard requested that the suit be dropped. There was a similar quiet end to Tesla's heated lawsuit against one-time partner Fisker in December (see Can't we all just get along?).

However, Tesla seems to be moving along nicely, posting its first-ever profit this month and announcing plans yesterday to move its corporate headquarters and power-train manufacturing to the Stanford Research Park in Palo Alto, Calif.