Elon Musk
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Retrofitting new powertrains to used cars isn't something that automakers have done, historically--but electric cars may change that rule. Now, Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk has suggested that the Silicon Valley electric-car maker will offer a replacement battery for the 2008-2012 Tesla Roadsters that were its first production cars. Musk's announcement came in a mid-July interview with the British magazine Auto Express, in which Musk largely reiterated what is known about the company's upcoming Model III. DON'T MISS: Tesla's Next Electric Car Line: Roundup Of What We Know Now At the end of the...
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Tesla Model S Drive-Unit Replacements: How Big A Problem?
It was a car company's worst public-relations nightmare. Edmunds.com, the widely-read automotive website, bought a Tesla Model S for long-term testing in February 2013. After nine months and 11,000 miles, the car developed an ominous grinding noise under acceleration and deceleration. Under...
David Noland -
Tesla: 8,763 Cars Built, 7,579 Sold, 'Potential' Nevada Gigafactory Ground Broken: Q2 Earnings Report
Tesla Motors built 8,763 Model S electric cars and delivered 7,579 of them to customers during the second quarter, according to just-released second-quarter results. It expects to build about 9,000 cars this quarter, and deliver 7,800, largely due to a two-week production shutdown for retooling at...
John Voelcker -
Tesla CEO Elon Musk Makes It Big: Will Appear On 'The Simpsons' As Himself
Wealth? Success? Power? All of these fade to insignificance as ways to show you've "made it" in life, compared to a guest appearance on The Simpsons. Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk has certainly made it, and to prove it he'll be guest-starring in the 26th season of the popular cartoon comedy. READ...
Antony Ingram -
First RHD Tesla Model S Electric Cars In Asia Delivered In Hong Kong
Right-hand drive Tesla Model S electric cars have already begun to trickle out in the United Kingdom, but now they're hitting the Asian markets too. The first Asian right-hand drive Model S have now been delivered to the first eight customers in Hong Kong. MUST SEE: Decoding Toyota's Electric-Car...
Antony Ingram -
Musk Continues To Back Nikola Tesla Museum, This Time With $1 Million
Tesla is such a hot topic in the electric car world at the moment, the name itself has almost lost meaning. Luckily, Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk still appreciates the value of the Tesla name. To prove it, he's donating $1 million, and a Tesla Supercharger, to a museum dedicated to the company's...
Antony Ingram -
When he's not running electric-car startup Tesla Motors, its CEO Elon Musk has a couple of other jobs on the side. In fact, he's not only involved in CEO of one startup, but three--the other two being SpaceX (privately-funded rockets) and Solar City (solar-panel leasing), where he's chairman of the board. Solar City hit the news last week when it announced it would buy Silevo, a startup maker of high-quality solar cell modules. That closely held startup is based in Fremont, California, the very same Silicon Valley city where Tesla's Model S assembly plant is located. As reported in The Wall...
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Tesla Model S Battery Swapping: Will It Ever Actually Arrive?
Exactly a year ago, Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk presided over a flashy demonstration in which the battery pack of a Tesla Model S electric car was apparently swapped from underneath within 90 seconds and replaced with a fresh pack. The event generated a huge amount of press, and subsequent coverage...
John Voelcker -
Nissan Wants In On Tesla, BMW Electric-Car Charging Talks: Report
With modern, mass-market electric cars on sale for three and a half years now, you might think that the path for growth has been pretty much laid out by now. But the great disruptor, Silicon Valley electric-car startup Tesla Motors, may be changing the playbook once again. According to a report in...
John Voelcker -
Musk: Tesla Going Open Source, Lifting Patents 'In Good Faith'
Tesla Motors, the California electric-car maker, won't participate in a patent war over electric cars and associated technology, as it runs counter to the success of EVs. It's one of the messages conveyed in a terse post from CEO Elon Musk on the Tesla Motors Blog. And it could be good news for...
Bengt Halvorson -
Rumor: Long-Wheelbase Tesla Model S Coming Later This Year?
The Tesla rumor mill is never quiet for long, and the latest one suggests that the company is developing a long-wheelbase version of its Model S sedan, specifically for the Chinese market. Tesla Motors just recently launched in China, obviously a key market for it and every other automaker, and one...
John Voelcker -
Tesla To Offer Supercharger As Fast-Charging Standard? Free To Drivers, Yes
Electric-car maker Tesla Motors, and more specifically its CEO Elon Musk, has been dropping hints for a while now that it proposes to open up the specifications of its Supercharger DC fast-charging standard for use by other manufacturers. An article yesterday in Engadget claimed Tesla was planning...
John Voelcker -
Many entrepreneurs have tried to start car companies in the U.S. over the past century, but the last person to do so from the ground up with a brand that survives to this day was Walter P. Chrysler. He started his company in December 1924--which indicates the magnitude of the challenge faced by Elon Musk, CEO of startup electric-car maker Tesla Motors. DON'T MISS: Five Facts About Tesla & Electric Cars That May Surprise You But there's one entrepreneur, largely forgotten even in the car industry today, who came closer than any other to launching a successful company--and he's the man Musk...
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Tesla Annual Meeting Yesterday: What We Learned That Was New
Tesla Motors held its annual shareholder meeting yesterday afternoon, and as always, a few nuggets of news emerged from CEO Elon Musk. You can read a complete transcript here, but here are some quick bullet points on items that struck us as newsworthy: Tesla electric cars have now covered 344...
John Voelcker -
Tesla's Elon Musk Should Stop Making Electric Cars, Focus On Batteries, Bond Trader Says
Elon Musk has probably been given a lot of advice during his time at Tesla--some good, and some bad. Bond manager Jeffrey Gundlach is the latest to offer his own take on the business to Musk though--and it isn't what you might be expecting. According to Bloomberg, Gundlach has suggested the Tesla...
Antony Ingram -
Next-Generation Tesla Electric Car Won't Be 'Model E' After All
Tesla's third-generation car, currently planned for volume production in late 2017, is now officially nameless again. According to Fortune, the company has abandoned its trademark application for the name "Model E," which had been widely assumed to apply to the new vehicle. DON'T MISS: Tesla's Next...
John Voelcker -
Tesla Deal To Supply Toyota RAV4 EV Powertrain To End This Year
Several news reports over the weekend noted that Tesla's contract to supply Toyota with electric powertrains for its RAV4 EV crossover would end next year. In the words of Tesla's latest quarterly report, cited by Bloomberg in a Saturday news story, “Toyota is expected to end the current RAV4...
John Voelcker -
Tesla Sales On Target, Gigafactory Groundbreaking Next Month: FINAL UPDATE
Tesla Motors released its first-quarter earnings this afternoon, logging revenue of $713 million on deliveries of 6,457 Model S electric cars. That's essentially the number it had said it would sell in the quarter, but the total is slightly down from the record 6,892 sold in the prior quarter. It...
John Voelcker -
This Wednesday, Tesla Motors will release its first-quarter financial results--one part of which will be its electric-car sales total from January through March. If the usual practice holds true, Tesla will provide a single global sales total, not breaking it down by market or month as other automakers do. What may be obscured is whether Tesla's U.S. sales have flattened--and, if so, whether this is due to capacity constraints and export demands, or a leveling-off of customer interest. DON'T MISS: Plug-In Electric Car Sales In April: Leaf Widens Lead, Volt Flat Again: FINAL UPDATE On the...
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Tesla Gigafactory Site Choice Due Soon--Or, Maybe Two Sites
Tesla CEO Elon Musk isn't just planning one site for the company's future battery gigafactory--he's actually looking at two. As a way of avoiding "last minute issues" on a possible site for the factory, Tesla Motors [NSDQ:TSLA] will break ground at two sites, reports Bloomberg. Tesla announced its...
Antony Ingram -
FTC Comes Out In Favor Of Tesla Direct Sales, Against Dealer-Backed Bans
The ongoing fight between Tesla Motors and car dealers across the country has spilled from the headlines into the legal system, but so far, the outcome is far from certain. Will Tesla be allowed to sell its cars directly to consumers? Or is there some state interest in forcing Tesla into the dealer...
Nelson Ireson -
Tesla Gigafactory Faces Skepticism From Panasonic, Analysts
Elon Musk, CEO of startup electric-car maker Tesla Motors, is no doubt used to skepticism. Now he faces new doubts over the company's plans for a massive "gigafactory" costing as much as $5 billion to manufacture more lithium-ion cells than any other plant in the world. DON'T MISS: Tesla's...
John Voelcker -
Memo To TV News Shows: Tesla Electric Cars Don't Make Engine Noises
If you watched 60 Minutes on Sunday night--perhaps wondering whether the show would target the Tesla Model S electric car--you may have been relieved. The segment, "Fast Cars and Rocket Ships," was nothing less than a laudatory paean to the vision and accomplishments of Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk...
John Voelcker -
Tesla Model S To Get Titanium Battery Shield, Plus Deflectors: BREAKING
Tesla Motors announced this morning that it will fit three new underbody components to all Model S electric cars to add further protection against impacts from road debris, which caused a pair of fires in its cars last fall. Those two Model S cars were severely damaged when their battery packs...
John Voelcker