Tesla CEO Elon Musk said the company had conducted customer studies in designing its Cybertruck long-term.
He says he doesn’t pay attention to competitors or know anything about other electric vehicles on the market.
And the complaint that the autopilot call is misleading to Tesla’s driving assistance system, which has been linked to a number of accidents? “Idiot.”
In a wide-ranging interview with Automotive News Publisher Jason Stein last week, the 49-year-old Musk appeared unbothered by the product-related headaches that often vex his competitors or the billions of dollars that can hinge on his declarations. At one point he made a “stream-of-consciousness guess” that Tesla will start construction on a third U.S. assembly plant in four or five years, and later he suggested the company might build a minivan before largely dismissing the idea in the next sentence.
To Musk’s credit, Tesla continues to maintain speed with the electric vehicle sales industry; she pioneered a virtual retail style that is becoming popular amid the coronavirus pandemic; and has posted 4 consecutive quarterly gains, though largely due to the sale of regulatory credits to competitors, which says it is not watching very closely. Despite many demanding production situations, and more than a few unsealed missealeds on Twitter, Tesla has increased its value, and its market capitalization doubled after Musk publicly qualified that its inventory was worth too much.
“I have to do something good, in terms of my style of control,” Musk said. “Tesla is twice as much as the rest of the American automotive industry combined.”
He said he hopes to continue roiling the industry by launching the Cybertruck pickup next year. Although Tesla is entering a high-stakes segment with fiercely loyal customers, Musk admitted the truck was not guided by any of the focus groups or outreach to would-be buyers that Ford, Chevrolet and Ram have relied on over the decades to hone their designs.
“Customer search?” said, before bursting into laughter. “We just made a car that we think is wonderful and that looks super strange. I just wanted to make a futuristic war tank, anything that can come out of Blade Runner or Aliens or something, but also very functional.”
The Cybertruck is different from everything you have on the market. It has a sharp-edged stainless metal exterior and a glass that is considered bulletproof, although two windows broke when hit with a metal ball during an impromptu demonstration of durability at last fall’s presentation.
Musk said Tesla intentionally made the van as different as you could imagine and felt no stress to succeed.
“It can be a bigger sports car than a Porsche 911, a truck bigger than an F-150, and it’s armored and looks like a kind of kick of the future. That was the goal, recognizing that it can be a total failure,” he said. “But I wasn’t too worried because if it turns out that no one needs to buy a strange-looking truck, we’re going to build a truck in general, no problem.” There are many trucks in general that look a lot like you; You may notice the difference slightly. And, of course, we can just make a copy truck; It’s easy. That’s our alternative strategy. “
Musk has repeatedly taken jabs at Ford’s industry-leading F-Series pickups, at one point posting a video of the Cybertruck overpowering an F-150 in a tug-of-war stunt.
But the Cybertruck is expected to be classified as a medium-duty pickup, putting it more on par with Ford’s Super Duty or Chevrolet’s Silverado HD. Musk told Automotive News the Cybertruck would not be sold globally.
“Actually, we essentially make this truck an American kick,” he said. “The purpose is to kick as much as possible with this truck. We need it to be anything I can use to tow a boat, a horse trailer, take stucons off the ground, do OFF-road and not.” “I don’t have to worry about scratching the paint because there’s no paint. You can break rocks and be okay.”
Musk said at least 200,000 consumers have filed $100 refundable deposits for the Cybertruck since the company began accepting them in November. But despite the competitive beards thrown at Ford, he doesn’t necessarily seek to get a percentage of the player’s loan market established by poaching its consumers.
“We’re not really trying to target anyone,” he said. “If they like the Cybertruck, cool. If they don’t, yeah. We’re not trying to play some marketing game. We’re just trying to create products that people will love.”
Still, he said the Cybertruck would be ideal in places or for off-road adventures. It will come with an on-board generator, an integrated air compressor and bulletproof frame panels.
“So it’s probably useful in the apocalypse,” he says. “Things seem more apocalyptic in those days. Let me tell you, the truck you need in the apocalypse is the Cybertruck.”
Musk’s tone was clouded when asked if Tesla continues to use the autopilot call for its drive force assistance generation amid court cases that make it appear that its cars are fully autonomous. A German court ruled in July that Tesla had misled consumers and banned the company from announcing autopilot.
Several drivers died after their Teslas hit items and other vehicles, adding trucks with fireplaces and semi-trailers, while autopilot was activated. YouTube videos of drivers sleeping, reading or climbing in the back seat after the formula is activated accumulate tens of thousands of views.
Musk erified at the concept of that so-called clarification.
“Absolutely not, it’s ridiculous, ” he said. “People who misuse autopilot are not because they are new to autopilot and don’t perceive it. People who use autopilot for the first time are incredibly paranoid about it. It’s not like, ‘If you just brought another name, I’d treat it differently. If something is wrong with autopilot, it’s because someone misuses it and uses it directly against the way we said it deserves to be used.”
Musk said the call based on the generation of the aircraft that helps, but does not replace, pilots. Musk said Tesla might have a “full autonomous driving” generation by the end of the year, but notes that it still requires consumers to be completely careful while autopilot is on.
“It’s not like an amateur who just won the car and, based on the call, idea he would immediately accept as true with the car to drive,” he said. “It’s a stupid premise to be angry with the autopilot call. You idiot.”
Tesla faces a year of a higher festival by established automakers and start-ups looking to capture some of their marketing magic.
But electric cars remain a fraction of the entire U.S. industry, with only a 1.4% market percentage in the first part of the year, and analysts continue to sue customers.
Musk said he was surprised by the industry’s slowness in deploying desirable electric cars and seemed unaware why competing cars are not promoting in greater numbers.
“I don’t really pay attention to that kind of thing,” he says. “I don’t really look at competitors. I’m just looking, what are we doing with our products and we have interaction in self-control?”
However, one potential competitor who caught his attention is Rivian Automotive Inc. In July, Tesla filed a lawsuit accusing Rivian of an “alarming pattern” of robbing his workers and stealing industry secrets.
“They took a lot of tesla’s active treasures on USB sticks and computers and the like,” Musk said. “It is not good to borrow our high-value assets and for others to violate your confidentiality agreements. They do bad things, so we chase them.”
Musk, who slept overnight at his workplace and walked through the factory to help succeed over production challenges, said he thought of Tesla’s succession in the most sensible business, but planned to continue leading the automaker for as long as possible.
In the charge to present the Cybertruck, Semi and New Roadster in the coming years, Musk said he plans to load a compact vehicle or van. In the long run, in the end, it would like Tesla to produce 20 million new cars a year. Volkswagen, the world’s largest automaker, built $10.8 million last year.
“We need to verify to make a genuine hole in sustainable shipping and sustainable energy storage,” he said. “If we could update 1% of the global fleet a year, I could say, “OK, we’re making progress on sustainable shipping.”
Send us a letter
Do you have an opinion on this story? Click here to send a letter to the editor, and we can publish it in printed form.
You can opt out at any time from the links contained in those emails. For more information, please see our privacy policy.
Our mission
(877) 812-1584
send us an email