Former Tesla CFO Deepak Ahuja Joins Redwood Materials

Deepak Ahuja, who led Tesla’s finances through its 2010 IPO and early expansion, has joined Redwood Materials as Chief Financial Officer.

His appointment reunites him with Redwood founder and CEO JB Straubel, Tesla’s former Chief Technology Officer, bringing original Tesla leadership together within the North American battery supply chain.

Position at Tesla

Ahuja played a pivotal role in Tesla’s formative years. He came aboard in 2008 during the company’s startup phase and served as CFO for 11 years across two separate terms.

He helped steer Tesla through the 2008 cash crunch and guided its evolution from a niche roadster maker into a global company before passing the CFO role to Zach Kirkhorn in 2019.

After Tesla, Ahuja became CFO of Verily Life Sciences (Alphabet/Google’s healthcare division) and later Chief Business and Financial Officer at Zipline, a drone logistics company. His return to batteries at Redwood comes as the firm shifts from a pure recycling focus to domestic production of cathode and anode materials.

Redwood Transitions into Energy Company

Redwood Materials recently restructured, reducing its workforce by 10% to concentrate resources on its fastest-growing area: Redwood Energy.

Launched in mid-2025, Redwood Energy repurposes retired EV batteries into grid-scale energy storage systems. The unit has already deployed a 63-MWh microgrid in Nevada and secured second-life battery partnerships with major automakers including Rivian and GM.

Redwood currently holds roughly 70% of the U.S. battery recycling market and is valued at over $6 billion following a $425 million Series E funding round earlier this year that included participation from Google and Nvidia.

Redwood IPO?

Although Ahuja’s arrival prompted speculation about a public offering given his experience taking Tesla public, he said in an interview with CNBC that it is too early to discuss an IPO today.

He emphasized a current focus on "disciplined execution" and scaling hardware-intensive manufacturing. That entails vertical integration from recycling feedstock to producing battery materials and deploying energy storage, in a manner similar to Tesla.

Redwood Materials is building a closed-loop system that Ahuja views as structurally unique, and the US Department of Energy has agreed to provide a $2 billion loan, alongside venture backing, to reach 20 GWh of storage by 2028.