The works council elections at Tesla’s Gigafactory in Grünheide have delivered another blow to IG Metall. The independent list “Giga United” secured an outright majority. Union fighter Elon Musk, who ran a campaign against IG Metall, surfaces as the winner.
The voting results leave little room for interpretation. Of the 37 seats on the new works council, 24 went to non-union lists (the lion’s share to “Giga United”), led by incumbent council chair Michaela Schmitz.
IG Metall’s list “Tesla Workers GFFB” came second, with 13 seats. That is three fewer than in the previous council.
“Unfortunately, it was not enough to secure a majority,” said IG Metall lead candidate Laura Arndt in a statement. “We will continue to do our utmost in the new works council to bring about change for our colleagues and us at the Gigafactory.”
Sidelined on home turf
The outcome is striking given Germany’s industrial relations landscape. IG Metall dominates works councils at Volkswagen, BMW, and Mercedes, but at Tesla, it has remained an outsider since the plant opened in 2022.
The core of the dispute: IG Metall is pushing for a collective bargaining agreement, which plant director André Thierig flatly rejects. Tesla maintains that working conditions are good and wages above average; the union disagrees.
Works councils are a cornerstone of German labour relations. These elected employee bodies negotiate with management on everything from working hours to pay structures.
The fact that Tesla’s council has now been majority non-union for two consecutive election cycles is without precedent in the German car industry. It’s one more sign of how a new dawn is rising for its coveted automotive sector.
Video warning
The run-up to the election was anything but quiet. Before voting began, Elon Musk sent a video message to workers at the Brandenburg site, in which he issued an indirect warning against the union.
“Things will certainly become more difficult if there are, so to speak, external organisations pushing Tesla in the wrong direction,” Musk said.
“We will not close the factory, but realistically, we will also not expand it.” In other words, of IG Metall climbs on board, Musk loses interest in growing Grünheide.
The question is whether that is a good idea from a business perspective. The plant’s actual output remains well below its theoretical maximum.
According to data from analysis firm Inovev, as cited by Handelsblatt, the factory produced just 149,040 vehicles in 2025 – less than 40 percent of the site’s 375,000-unit annual design capacity.
Thierig disputed that figure on LinkedIn, claiming output exceeded 200,000 vehicles, though he provided no alternative number. Tesla has invested more than 5 billion euros in Grünheide since 2020, and according to Thierig, nearly 100 million euros are currently being invested in battery cell production.
Recording scandal
The conflict between Tesla management and IG Metall reached a new peak last month when Tesla’s management accused a union member of secretly recording a works council meeting and filed a criminal complaint.
The union dismissed the allegation as a “calculated lie.” Both sides took legal action; they ultimately settled with the labour court over statements made in the dispute.
There’s no denying that the standoff at Giga Berlin is playing out against a backdrop of declining European sales and a consumer backlash in Germany, partly driven by Musk’s vocal support for the far-right AfD party.
That IG Metall nevertheless finished as the second-largest force – “despite all the attacks by management,” as its district leader Jan Otto puts it – is something the union is framing as a relative moral victory.
