In a statement on Tesla's website on Wednesday, six of Tesla's nine directors said the board had met several times over the last week to discuss such an idea and was "taking the appropriate next steps to evaluate this." The six directors are Brad Buss, Robyn Denholm, Ira Ehrenpreis, Antonio Gracias, Linda Johnson Rice and James Murdoch.

The following is a snapshot of the nine members on Tesla's board:

Member Background

Member since

Elon Musk 2004 Tesla's Chief Executive Officer and

co-founder. Owns a roughly 20 percent

stake in Tesla. Also serves as CEO of

SpaceX.

Brad Buss 2009 Served as chief financial officer of

solar panel installer SolarCity for

two years before retiring in 2016.

Tesla bought SolarCity that year. Buss

was also CFO of Cypress Semiconductor.

Ira 2007 Founder and managing partner of

Ehrenpreis venture capital firm DBL Partners,

which is an investor in Tesla,

according to its website. Ehrenpreis

bagged the first Model 3 car, having

been the first to put down a deposit,

but later gifted it to Musk.

Antonio 2007 Lead independent director at Tesla

Gracias since 2010. Founder and chief

executive officer of Valor Equity

Partners. In May this year,

influential proxy adviser ISS

recommended that investors vote

against his election to the board.

Robyn 2014 The first woman to join Tesla's board,

Denholm Denholm is chief operations officer of

telecom firm Telstra and the ex-CFO of

network gear maker Juniper Networks

.

James 2017 The CEO of Twenty-First Century Fox

Murdoch and chairman of Sky Plc

. ISS in May recommended that

investors vote against his election to

the board as he is "overboarded" -

serving on several other boards.

Steve 2009 Co-founder of Silicon Valley venture

Jurvetson capital firm Draper Fisher Jurvetson.

He resigned from DFJ in November 2017,

following allegations of sexual

harassment against him. He is on a

leave of absence from Tesla's board

since then.

Kimbal 2004 Elon Musk's brother and co-founder of

Musk restaurant chain The Kitchen. Kimbal,

according to media reports, has been

criticized for his lack of experience

in the auto industry, as well as his

role as an independent director at

burrito chain Chipotle, which

has faced major health and food safety

issues.

Linda Rice 2017 First African-American and second

woman to join Tesla's board. Current

chairman of Johnson Publishing Co,

home to Ebony and Jet magazines.

(Reporting by Vibhuti Sharma and Arjun Panchadar in Bengaluru; Editing by Sai Sachin Ravikumar)