Elon Musk

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) released a statement last week confirming that it will investigate the recent Tesla Model X rollover accident in Pennsylvania after the driver claimed that the Autopilot was activated during the crash.

Last week, Tesla said that they couldn’t access the data logs remotely because of the damage on the vehicle, but a spokesperson also said that they “have no reason to believe that Autopilot had anything to do with this accident”.
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Following the news of the fatal crash in a Model S in May, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) implied that Tesla could be planning to disable the Autopilot when drivers are not using it properly, but now Elon Musk gave a quick interview to the publication (Paywall) and says that the company has no plan to disable the Autopilot.
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Adam Jonas, Morgan Stanley’s analyst covering Tesla, has been predicting a new “on-demand mobility service” program for the automaker ever since he had a very one-sided conversation with Elon Musk in which the CEO said a lot by refusing to answer a question about whether the company plans on offering a service like Uber or maybe partnering with the startup.
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Over the weekend, Tesla CEO Elon Musk clarified the automaker’s use of the word ‘Beta’ in reference to the Autopilot system after Germany’s Federal Office for Motor Vehicles (KBA) said that it wouldn’t approve a feature on German roads if it is described as ‘Beta’. The agency said that the ‘beta-phase’ could mean ‘an incomplete status of the software’.

Elon Musk claimed that the word “beta” is not used in the “standard sense” of the word, but to make sure drivers “don’t get comfortable” with the system.
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Tesla Model 3 reservation holders will be happy to know that Tesla apparently already fixed that small trunk opening issue seen on the Model 3 prototypes, which has been a big concern for several early adopters.
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Almost a decade ago to the day (August 2, 2006), Elon Musk laid out Tesla’s mission in an awesome blog post titled ‘The Secret Tesla Motors Master Plan (just between you and me)‘. Now he is apparently almost ready to release a second part to this Master Plan.
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Yesterday, we reported on a strange article in which Fortune Magazine tried to make the case that Tesla should have disclosed the fatal Model S accident on Autopilot before raising capital through a secondary offering a few weeks after the fact. The publication claims that the accident was material to Tesla’s stock and therefore, it should have been announced when the company learned of the event and not when NHTSA decided it would launch a preliminary evaluation on June 30.

Elon Musk argued against it being material to Tesla’s valuation in an email to Fortune, but now the publication is somehow trying to use a boilerplate statement from Tesla to prove that Musk and the company previously considered the accident a material event, which is not necessarily the case.
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The Economic Times released an interesting article with a reaching title ‘How Elon Musk’s Tesla Motors maybe killing flamingos with its electric cars‘ yesterday. The claim is so absurd that it prompted Musk to mock it on Twitter:

Because of course I hate flamingos…(maybe try eating fewer flamingo eggs in your salad)https://t.co/tUKsWqCobo

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 5, 2016

While the endangerment of the Flamigos’ environment is not a laughing matter, the publication’s link back to Musk and Tesla certainly looks like one.
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Following the news of the fatal accident in a Tesla Model S on Autopilot, which happened in May but only came to light last week, Tesla CEO Elon Musk claims that about half of the approximately one million people who died in auto accidents last year would have been saved if the Tesla Autopilot was universally available.

He made the comment in a somewhat strange email conversation with a retired journalist.
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Mobileye, an Israel-based tech company developing some of the technology behind Tesla’s Autopilot, commented on the fatal Model S crash reported yesterday. A spokesperson said that the company’s current Automatic Emergency Braking (AEB) system is only meant for rear-end collision avoidance and since the crash was front (of the Model S) to side (of a truck), the system was not designed to avoid it.
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The Tesla Gigafactory 1 is the Chocolate Factory and Elon Musk is Willy Wonka!

Tesla quietly created a ‘Golden Ticket’ drawing for all the Model 3 reservation holders who placed a pre-order during the first day and randomly selected 12 winners to receive an all-expenses paid trip to the Gigafactory Grand Opening.
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Earlier this month, Bloomberg came out with a report claiming that signed a “non-binding memorandum of understanding” with Jinqiao Group, a Shanghai government-owned company, to invest in a $9 billion electric vehicle factory in the region. At the time, Tesla didn’t comment on the report, but now CEO Elon Musk denies that a deal was signed:

@mashable We haven't signed anything for a factory in China

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 27, 2016

Earlier this year, Musk confirmed that the automaker plans on securing a location and a local partner for a manufacturing facility in China by the middle of the 2016, but now we learn that there’s a possibility that Tesla will not have to create a partnership as the government is exploring the a lift of the cap on joint-ventures for automakers.
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Since Tesla announced its offer to buy SolarCity, which is still contingent on a vote by the shareholders, Wall Street has turned on the company with analysts issuing notes claiming that there’s little to no value in the deal. Barclays analyst Brian Johnson issued a note saying that he sees “little in the way of synergies and much in the way of cash burn.”

It’s not like Wall Street analysts have the best foresight, Johnson himself is ranked #2,713 out of 3,984 analysts on TipRank with an average return of -0.7%, but they represent the point of view of the financial sector.

As for the point of view from the actual customer offering/product side, a merger between Tesla and SolarCity will certainly open the door for some interesting product integrations and new distribution opportunities.
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During a conference call discussing the rationale surrounding Tesla’s (TSLA) offer to acquire SolarCity (SCTY) this morning, Elon Musk made a bold claim, something not unusual for the billionaire entrepreneur, he said that he sees potential for Tesla to become a trillion-dollar market cap company – which would be a first.
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Yesterday, Elon Musk surprised a lot of people when he announced that Tesla (TSLA) has made an offer to acquire SolarCity (SCTY). The entrepreneur is the largest individual shareholder of both companies – he owns about 21% of Tesla and 22% of SolarCity.

Some Tesla shareholders are already calling the deal a “bailout” of SolarCity, especially after Musk bought another $10 million worth of shares last year – before the stock fell 60% in 2016. The deal would allow him to convert his shares of SolarCity to Tesla shares at a favorable rate, but we now learn that the move might not be reactionary and actually long in the making.
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Today, Tesla (TSLA) announced that it submitted an offer to acquire SolarCity (SCTY), the leading solar installer in the US. Elon Musk is the largest individual shareholder of both companies. Due to his obvious interest in the deal, which is already being called a bailout by some shareholders, Musk decided to recuse himself from the vote at both companies and leave it to Tesla and SolarCity shareholders to decide on the possible consolidation of ‘Musk Industries’.
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We published an article on a video of a Tesla Model S going through a flooded tunnel over the weekend and Elon Musk, Tesla’s CEO, shared the article on his popular Twitter account. He then followed up with an interesting Tweet:

If curious abt TSWLM car, am still planning to do a sports sub car that can drive on roads. Just a side project. Limited market potential 🙂

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 19, 2016

TSWLM is the acronym of the title for the 1977 James Bond movie ‘The Spy Who Loved Me‘. In the movie, Bond was driving a modified Lotus Esprit that could change into a submarine. The vehicle they used in the movie was lost for years, but it was eventually found in a storage locker bought for $100 and three years ago, Elon Musk secretly bought it for ~$900,000 in a bidding war with another car collector.
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In the days following the unveiling of the Tesla Model 3 and the subsequent flood of pre-orders for the vehicle, CEO Elon Musk said that the automaker will be sending out a “token of appreciation” to those who stood in line at the store to reserve the Model 3 before it was even unveiled.

Token of appreciation for those who lined up coming via mail. Thought maybe 20-30 people per store would line up, not 800. Gifts on order.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 2, 2016

Indeed, some places had lines of over a thousand people waiting to order the vehicle sight unseen. Now the first reservation holders are reporting starting to receive the ‘thank you’ gift.
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Following reports of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) probing Tesla over a possible problem with the Model S’ suspension and the automaker’s goodwill agreement, it came to light that several false and/or misleading complaints were filed with NHTSA.

A spokesperson for NHTSA confirmed that the agency has not found any safety issue with Tesla’s suspensions and that the company has clarified the language in its goodwill agreement. It considers the issue resolved, but Tesla CEO Elon Musk shared on Twitter that something suspicious is going on with the suspension complaints:

Would seem to indicate that one or more people sought to create the false impression of a safety issue where none existed. Q is why?

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 10, 2016

It can be difficult to understand why would someone falsify complaints to an official agency, which can be harmful to both the company and time-wasting for the regulators. The most obvious explanation is always money, and Tesla brought it up in a blog post following last week’s events.
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Tesla recently attracted some criticisms over its Autopilot system. There are primarily two camps when its comes to approaches to developing self-driving cars. Some companies are gradually releasing more and more advanced autonomous and semi-autonomous features (level 2) leading to a fully autonomous system (level 4), like Tesla’s Autopilot, and others, like Google, are aiming to only release a system once the technology is ready for a fully (level 4) self-driving car.

Among the criticisms, scientist Andrew NG said that it was “irresponsible” for Tesla to ship the Autopilot and BMW’s CEO compared the system to an unreliable app. Now it’s Volvo’s turn to go after Tesla’s Autopilot for similar reasons.
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In a lengthy report published yesterday, the Desert Sun described the demise of a young lithium extraction startup and how Tesla tried and failed to buy it for $325 million in TSLA stock back in 2014. It offers an interesting look at Tesla’s acquisition process, something rare for the automaker. The company only made one acquisition: a tool and die company in Michigan.

The article is a long read, but a very interesting one if you have the time. Here’s a much shorter version if you just want the main takeaway points.