Elon Musk Touts Tesla Pickup Plans, Though Light on Detail
December 26 2017 - 7:34PM
Dow Jones News
By Tim Higgins
Elon Musk teased details for a pickup truck that would challenge
Ford Motor Co. and others in one of their most lucrative segments
-- though, true to form, the Tesla Inc. chief was vague about his
intentions.
In comments posted Tuesday on Twitter, Mr. Musk said the truck
would come after the electric-car maker releases a new compact
sport-utility vehicle, which the billionaire entrepreneur has
suggested could hit the road as soon as 2019.
Mr. Musk, responding to a question on the social-media platform
about how the truck's size would compare to Ford's best-selling
F-Series, said his pickup would be similar if not slightly bigger
"to account for a really gamechanging (I think) feature I'd like to
add."
A pickup would allow Tesla to enter a market that has long
fueled traditional U.S. auto makers' bottom lines. Analysts
estimate the average pickup earns more than $10,000 in profit for
Ford and General Motors Co.
The vague statement to his 17.1 million Twitter followers was a
classic Musk move: stoking enthusiasm for future products laid out
in his so-called "Master Plan, Part Deux" even as he struggles to
bring his latest vehicle to market.
Tesla is rushing to ramp up production of the Model 3 sedan
after delaying Mr. Musk's goal of making 5,000 a week by year's end
until late in the first quarter of next year.
The Silicon Valley company has attributed delays to battery-pack
assembly at its factory near Reno, Nev. The Wall Street Journal in
October reported an assembly plant in Fremont, Calif., wasn't ready
when production began in July.
"Seems like Tesla is biting off a lot and should focus to master
the Model 3 first," Michelle Krebs, an analyst for Autotrader, said
Tuesday.
Mr. Musk had said the arrival of the Model 3, which starts at
$35,000, would lift the company's overall vehicle production to
500,000 next year from about 84,000 last year, a goal he since has
shied from. Similarly, he has said the Model Y SUV could reach
500,000 to 1 million vehicles a year. "It's the obvious priority
after Model 3," he told analysts in August 2016.
"I promise that we will make a pickup truck right after Model
Y," Mr. Musk said in the conversation on Twitter. "Have had the
core design/engineering elements in my mind for almost 5 years. Am
dying to build it."
In April, Mr. Musk said on Twitter the new pickup would be
unveiled in 18 to 24 months. Then in September, as he prepared to
reveal a commercial semitrailer truck for 2019, he coyly responded
to a question on Twitter about whether the pickup would be next by
asking: "What if we just made a mini version of the Tesla
Semi?"
Mike Colias contributed to this article.
Write to Tim Higgins at Tim.Higgins@WSJ.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
December 26, 2017 19:19 ET (00:19 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2017 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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