On Thursday, Tesla’s stock dropped about 7% after CEO Elon Musk and his team’s nearly four-hour talk fell short of the expectations of investors hoping to learn more about a new, reasonably priced electric car.
At Tesla’s investor day on Wednesday, Musk and more than a dozen execs unveiled brand-new plans to slash assembly costs in half, invest in a new factory in Mexico, and talk about the business’s innovation in operations management.
The EV manufacturer’s “Master Plan 3” was unveiled at the event, but Musk provided few details about the ideas’ timelines or any potential new Tesla products. Merlin Investor’s founder Guido Petrelli noted, “The biggest surprise coming out of Tesla investor day is that there wasn’t a surprise.”
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Musk stated that Tesla will construct its upcoming auto plant in Mexico, close to Monterrey, but he didn’t offer any additional information besides the fact that the next-generation vehicle will be produced there.
Tesla’s senior vice president of powertrain and energy engineering, Drew Baglino, verified that construction on the company’s lithium refinery in Corpus Christi, Texas, has begun.
Musk claimed that AI makes him anxious and that a regulatory body is necessary to ensure that this “quite hazardous technology” serves the greater good.
The valuation of Tesla’s shares, which had decreased by roughly two-thirds in 2022, has increased by over 60% this year. “The markets were primed for a big announcement, perhaps on something like a more affordable new model. It may just have been a case of failing to live up to the hype”, AJ Bell’s investment director, Russ Mould, said.
In the past, Tesla events have made waves online, with Musk’s dance moves at the company’s Berlin plant opening in 2022 and an occasion in China in 2020 getting viral on social media. STMicroelectronics and Wolfspeed Inc., two suppliers and manufacturers of semiconductors, were affected by the company’s strategy to use 75% fewer silicon carbide vehicles while maintaining the performance and efficiency of the vehicles. In particular, STMicro will be negatively impacted by the reduction strategy, according to brokerage Equita.
In a move that mirrors the evolution in mobile phone billing, the business also intends to provide limitless overnight home charging in Texas for $30 per month. The company also praised its growing capacity for setting up production facilities rapidly.
The Corpus Christi lithium plant hopes to begin production within a year. Again, Tesla confirmed that the Cybertruck would be released this year, with mass manufacturing beginning in 2024.
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The US electric vehicle marketplace leader’s transformation from a niche player to a well-known automaker is the foundation of the new corporate strategy. Tesla released its two prior strategic plans in 2006 and 2016.
More than ten years ago, Musk released his first Master Plan, which outlined Tesla’s go-to-market plan of developing an electric sports car first, followed by a line of more affordable vehicles. With the Roadster, the Model S, and finally the Model 3 sedan—its least expensive model with a starting price of about $43,000—the business has carried out this vision.
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