Elon Musk’s ‘frugal genius’ who slashes costs down to the last dollar has a huge role in DOGE
Elon Musk’s deputy Steve Davis has spent more than 20 years helping the billionaire cut costs at businesses like SpaceX, the Boring Company and Twitter — making the engineer by training a natural choice for his new role at Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE for short.
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Davis is helping recruit staff at DOGE, Musk’s effort to reduce government waste, in addition to his day job as president of Musk’s tunneling startup, the Boring Company. At Boring, Davis has a reputation for frugality, signing off on costs as low as a few hundred dollars, according to people familiar with the conversations — unusual for a company that has raised about $800 million in capital. He also drives hard bargains with suppliers of products like raw steel, sensors, or even items as small as hose fittings, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing private information.
His favorite directive for staff doing the negotiations: “Go back and ask again.”
Davis has emerged as a key figure in Musk’s stable of company executives. An aerospace engineer by training, he’s spent time at SpaceX and Boring, and was brought in to help with the takeover of Twitter (now called X), where Musk and his team dramatically cut costs and headcount. Davis embraced the work with such fervor that for a while, he slept at the Twitter
