Redwood names Deepak Ahuja CFO

Battery recycling is turning into a capital-intensive industrial business — not just a clever climate startup story. That is why Redwood Materials bringing in Deepak Ahuja as CFO matters. On May 11, Redwood said Ahuja, the longtime former Tesla finance chief, is joining its leadership team as the company scales both battery materials and energy storage. The move lands at a moment when Redwood is building real infrastructure, raising big rounds, and getting pulled deeper into the U.S. push for domestic critical minerals and grid power. ### Who is Deepak Ahuja? Ahuja is not a generic finance hire. He spent roughly 11 years as Tesla’s CFO across two stints and was there through the company’s early scaling years, including its 2010 IPO. After Tesla, he held senior finance roles at Verily and then Zipline. So Redwood is getting someone who has already lived through the exact kind of messy, expensive transition it now faces — moving from ambitious plan to industrial execution. (redwoodmaterials.com) ### Why would Redwood want that now? Because Redwood is no longer just a recycler. The company says it now produces critical minerals like lithium, nickel, cobalt, and copper, makes battery components, and deploys energy storage systems for data centers and the grid. That is a much broader business than “collect old batteries and recover metals.” Each piece needs factories, equipment, customers, and financing structures that can survive long build cycles. (redwoodmaterials.com) A CFO with public-company and manufacturing experience becomes a strategic tool, not back-office support. ### What changed at Redwood recently? The biggest shift is scale. In January 2026, Redwood announced the final close of a $425 million Series E and said Google joined as an investor. Independent private-market trackers and secondary-market pages have also put Redwood’s valuation at more than $6 billion this year. That means Ahuja is stepping into a company that has already attracted major capital and now has to prove it can turn that money into durable operations. (redwoodmaterials.com) ### Is this really a Tesla reunion? Basically, yes. Redwood was founded in 2017 by JB Straubel, Tesla’s former CTO and still a Tesla board member. Redwood’s CTO, Colin Campbell, also came from Tesla, and Ahuja now joins that bench. That does not mean Redwood is “Tesla 2.0,” but it does show how much of the company’s operating DNA comes from people who learned inside Tesla’s manufacturing and battery world. (redwoodmaterials.com) ### Why does battery recycling need a heavyweight CFO? Because this business eats capital before it throws off steady returns. You have to secure feedstock, build processing capacity, manage commodity-price swings, and line up long-term customers. Redwood is also pushing into energy storage, including systems built with new and repurposed EV batteries, which adds another layer of project finance and operational complexity. Think of it less like hiring an accountant and more like hiring an air-traffic controller for a company with several runways opening at once. (cnbc.com) ### Does this mean an IPO is next? Not immediately. In coverage published the same day, Ahuja said it was too early to talk about an IPO. That is revealing. Redwood seems more focused on building systems, customers, and financial discipline first. The company may eventually go public, but this hire looks more like “get the house in order for a much bigger phase” than “ring the bell next quarter.” (redwoodmaterials.com) ### Why does this matter beyond Redwood? Because Redwood sits inside two crowded national priorities at once — battery supply chains and power infrastructure. The company is trying to create more domestic supply of battery materials while also selling storage systems that can support data centers and the grid. If that model works, Redwood becomes more than a recycler. It becomes part materials processor, part manufacturing supplier, and part energy infrastructure company. (techcrunch.com) ### Bottom line? Ahuja’s hire is a signal that Redwood thinks the hard part now is financial and operational scale. The technology story got it this far. The next chapter is about building a durable industrial company around it. (redwoodmaterials.com)