Elon Musk announced the CFO shift in the final moments of an earnings conference call on Wednesday night, saying 56-year-old Deepak Ahuja would be handing over the reins to 34-year-old Zach Kirkhorn
以下内容摘自Tesla Q4 2018 Earnings Conference Call：
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Elon Musk -- Co-Founder and Chief Executive Office
Yes. So let's see. The -- so Deepak is -- well, I'd like you to make the announcement, but Deepak is going to be retiring.
Deepak Ahuja -- Chief Financial Officer
Again.
Elon Musk -- Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer
Yes, from Tesla.
Deepak Ahuja -- Chief Financial Officer
Yes.
Elon Musk -- Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer
Deepak, I think it's now been -- you first started with Tesla about 11 years ago, right?
Deepak Ahuja -- Chief Financial Officer
When -- close to that, yes.
Elon Musk -- Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer
Yes, almost 11 years. Thank you for your tremendous contribution to Tesla. And he's announcing retirement but the retirement will not be immediate, but Deepak will continue to be at Tesla for a few more months and will continue to serve as a senior advisor to Tesla for probably years to come hopefully. And we thought long and hard about who the right person is to take over from Deepak, and that's Zach.
And Zach has been with Tesla now for nine years...
Zach Kirkhorn -- Vice President, Finance
Nine years.
Elon Musk -- Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer
Yes. So Zach, you had management and technology at Wharton undergrad and then worked at Tesla and then spent a couple of years at Harvard Business School, which I actually don't think was necessary, by the way.
Zach Kirkhorn -- Vice President, Finance
You told me that when I came back.
Elon Musk -- Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer
Yes, exactly. So Zach's incredibly talented, has made a huge contribution to Tesla over the years, and obviously a very well-known quality to the whole team and has the respect of the whole team. And Zach, I don't know if you'd like to say a few words?
Zach Kirkhorn -- Vice President, Finance
Yes, I will.
Elon Musk -- Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer
OK. Or do you want, Deepak, to save you?
Zach Kirkhorn -- Vice President, Finance
Deepak?
Deepak Ahuja -- Chief Financial Officer
Sure. OK. Thank you. Yes -- no.
Well, first of all, Elon, thank you very much for the opportunity for me to be here and be here again a second time. I've learned a lot from you and I've been always inspired by you, and I've been also very inspired by the team at Tesla, who are incredibly brilliant, very passionate and just amazingly perseverant, the best team I could imagine. So thank you everybody for that. There is no good time to make this change.
We felt generally this was a good time. It's a new chapter, a new year. Tesla has had two great quarters of profitability, cash flow, so now a really solid foundation. And I feel really good about Zach taking over as the CFO.
He's proven himself with his many years of experience and many tough challenges that he's worked on and really excited to have Zach take on this role, and I'll be here to support him and make sure we are all successful as a company.
Zach Kirkhorn -- Vice President, Finance
Yes, well, thank you, Deepak. Thank you, Elon. So my name is Zach Kirkhorn. Just a brief background on myself.
So, I joined Tesla just under nine years ago when it's a super small company with a lot of potential ahead of us and I was attracted to the mission and the vision of the company. Throughout that time, I've been deep in the operations of every major program of the company, from the Roadster to Model S and X, Model 3, scaling our energy business and more things to come, which we've talked about on the call. I feel we're starting 2019 with a very strong financial foundation. We have enough cash to continue launching new programs and developing new technologies, and we're able to service upcoming debt obligations with our forecasted cash flows.
My focus, alongside the talented and amazingly passionate team at Tesla, is to ensure we continue the terrific momentum on cost management and operational efficiency, which will enable us more -- enable more access to our products around the world, which is key to achieving the mission of the company. On a personal note, Deepak, a huge thank you to you for your leadership, mentorship, and support and very much looking forward to discussing our progress on future earnings calls.
Elon Musk -- Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer
Great.
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