Tesla is gambling its future with the Model 3, its mid-range car

Tesla

AFP

Thursday, 27 July 2017 14:00

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Thursday, 27 July 2017 14:00

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It is crucial for the future of the american manufacturer Tesla: the first copies of its electric car Model 3, smaller and less expensive than the Model S and X to conquer the general public, will be delivered on Friday.

The boss of Tesla, Elon Musk, has planned a festive ceremony in the presence of the employees in the factory in Fremont, located not far from San Francisco (west Usa) on the occasion of the delivery of the vehicles to the first thirty customers, which will be for the most part of employees of the group.

Elon Musk, a billionaire with multiple caps, also the head of the company SpaceX, announced at the beginning of the month after the launch of the production, which is expected to reach 100 copies in August and 1,500 in September, before, hopefully, 20, 000 per month at the end of the year.

The Model 3 represents a critical step in the ambitions of Mr. Musk, who wants to make Tesla, founded in 2003, is a manufacturer of vehicles to a great series.

“The strategy of Tesla is to enter the market by the top of the range” and then to “move rapidly to the lowest level to produce larger volumes and lower prices with each new model,” wrote the billionaire in 2006.

According to the projections, the manufacturer has sold over the first six months of the year between 47 and 50,000 cars in the world thanks to the Model S and Model X. The Model 3 should help him reach his target of 500,000 cars sold in 2018 and one million by 2020. By comparison, the top two global manufacturers, German Volkswagen and the japanese Toyota sell more than 10 million cars per year.

A success of the Model 3 would also be of a nature to reassure the markets: some analysts are questioning the growth prospects of the group, considering that the demand for the Model S and Model X caps.

– Auto-pilot – “smaller” and “more simple” than its big sisters, the Model 3 is intended to be more accessible: it costs 35 000 US dollars, which is half the base price of the S.

The 3 has a lot less options ” than the Model S, says Tesla, but it also has the automatic flight control system, which allows the car to make a large number of maneuvers.

Its battery allows it to run ” at least 215 miles (345 km), according to the group, compared to almost 600 km for the model Tesla is the most powerful.

Tesla Model 3

Until now, the strategy of Elon Musk has paid off: although most manufacturers are currently in their range of electric cars of size and autonomy, variety, the group reign today on the market of the electrical because he was able to create a “niche” with the models X and S. The point of arguing this year to General Motors, the biggest manufacturer of auto american with more than three million vehicles sold in the United States last year, the place of honor of the first market capitalization on Wall Street.

The Model 3, which has been the subject of almost 400,000 pre-orders, however, has already a competitor for direct, Bolt from General Motors. But it should not make a lot of shade, it sells poorly, to the point that GM plans to temporarily stop production lines in the United States for stocks.

Both electric and partially autonomous cars Tesla combine the two aspects seen as the future of the automobile, on which work not only the majority of manufacturers but also of the computer mega-corporations such as Google or Apple.

Clean cars are part of the environmental process, which guides a large part of the many projects of Elon Musk, a 45-year-old.

Present in solar energy, with the solar panels SolarCity, but also in space exploration with SpaceX, Elon Musk also wants to develop batteries for the house. It has also revived, without taking part directly, the project Hyperloop, to transport, on Land, passengers in capsules flowing in a tube at low pressure and a speed of up to 1 200 km/h.

The rise of the automobile production also accompanies the construction of a “giga-plant” for batteries in Nevada (west) the production of which should begin by the end of the year.