Tesla’s software team is losing one of the engineers responsible for two of the company’s most important technologies. Thomas Dmytryk, who helped build Tesla’s OTA update system and later worked on the Robotaxi platform, has announced he is leaving after 11 years.
Dmytryk shared the news in a lengthy LinkedIn post reflecting on his time at Tesla, describing the experience as “the ride of a lifetime” after joining the company during a much earlier phase of its growth.
“After 11 incredible years at Tesla, I’m closing the book,” he wrote. “It’s been the ride of a lifetime: always on the news, innovating relentlessly, constantly pushing the limits.” (via Not A Tesla App)
According to his LinkedIn profile, Dmytryk joined Tesla in early 2015, when the company was as he described it, a “niche automaker with only 50K cars delivered and lots of ambitions.
At that time, his team was responsible for building the software systems that allow Tesla vehicles to receive updates remotely, communicate with the Tesla mobile app, and execute remote commands. The infrastructure was relatively small, but it would eventually become one of Tesla’s defining technological advantages.
Over the following decade, that architecture expanded dramatically as Tesla’s global fleet grew toward nearly 10 million vehicles. Today, OTA updates enable Tesla to deliver new features, improve performance, fix bugs, and even address certain recalls remotely without requiring a service visit.
Later in his tenure, Dmytryk’s team took on the task of developing the infrastructure for the company’s Robotaxi ride-hailing network. “Then came our moonshot: create ride hailing capability and bring it to the world in a way that has never been seen before,” he wrote.
According to Dmytryk, the project quickly evolved from an early proof-of-concept into a full production system as additional teams across the company became involved.
That work ultimately helped power Tesla’s emerging autonomous ride-hailing platform, which first launched in Austin in July 2025.
Despite praising Tesla’s future and saying the company is “just getting started,” Dmytryk said he decided to step away from the demanding pace of the company’s engineering culture to prioritize time with his family.
“Human life’s always been my North Star, right now I need to be with mines,” he wrote. He also praised Tesla employees across the organization, highlighting the dedication and talent of the engineers and teams he worked alongside for more than a decade.
As we reported yesterday, Dmytryk’s exit adds to a growing list of senior Tesla leaders who have left the company over the past two years. Several long-tenured executives and engineers have departed during a period when Tesla is shifting its focus toward artificial intelligence, robotics, and autonomous transportation.
Most recently, Tesla Vice President of Finance Sendil Palani announced he is leaving after 17 years with the company just yesterday. That followed the exit of VP Raj Jegannathan in February, and the departure of Program Managers for Cybertruck, Model 3, and Model Y.
