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Murdoch, already an independent director of Tesla, said he wanted the job, the report said.
Son of Fox mogul Rupert Murdoch, he joined Tesla's board of directors last year after years of working with media companies. He has no experience in manufacturing and has never run a company manufacturing cars or electric vehicles.
Murdoch could not be immediately contacted for comment. Tesla did not respond to a request for comment. Twenty-First Century Fox declined to comment.
Musk is the public face of Tesla and any president should face his powerful personality. With its bold vision and daring, Tesla's valuation has sometimes overshadowed that of traditional, well-established American manufacturers, with billions of revenues, and the company has assembled legions of fans, despite repeated production problems.
"The question about James Murdoch is:" Is he the guy who will be able to establish this level of authority with Elon Musk? "" Asked Abby Adlerman, CEO of Boardspan, a corporate governance consulting firm.
Investor concerns over the tight link between the Tesla board and Musk led to the addition of two independent directors, including Murdoch, in July 2017.
Earlier this year, leading US voting advisers Glass Lewis & Co and Institutional Shareholder Services, as well as union-affiliated investment advisor CtW Investment Group, had urged investors to vote "against" Murdoch's re-election as as director of Tesla at the annual meeting of the company. held on June 5th.
Although CtW cited a lack of relevant experience and a "troubled history as a director and director," the two proxy companies warned that Murdoch had already sat on too many boards of directors.
Mr. Murdoch currently serves on the boards of Twenty-First Century Fox and News Corp. He resigned from Sky 's board of directors on Tuesday, following Comcast' s takeover of the broadcaster.
Murdoch was forced to leave the post of president of Sky, then of BSkyB, in 2012 after being involved in the scandal of hacking in Britain. He returned to Sky's board of directors in 2016 after rebuilding his career at Fox.
Courteney Keatinge, research director at Glass Lewis, said Wednesday that the departure of Murdoch from Sky could allay some concerns, but that the presidency of Tesla would still require a significant commitment, the company is under pressure on several fronts.
"I would always have reservations about the time that he could attribute to that," Keatinge said.
According to the FT report, external options were still under study.
According to Dieter Waizenegger, executive director of CtW Investment Group, it was important to choose a wide range of candidates because "investors really need to be wary of the board making the right choice" by choosing Murdoch.
His brother Lachlan Murdoch will succeed Murdoch as general manager of Twenty First Century Fox, after the media group has finalized the sale of most of its assets to Walt Disney.
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