This can’t be done, however, until Tesla Motors – which Musk is renaming, simply, Tesla, to reflect its broader goals – completes a merger with California-based solar power company SolarCity, which Musk, as chairman, owns a 22-percent stake.
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Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk unveiled “part two” of his “master plan” for the electric auto company July 20, a four-part outline involving energy generation and storage; an expanded Tesla lineup; autonomous driving; and vehicle sharing.
When it comes to specific products, Tesla says it has plans to move beyond its current Model S, Model X and Model 3, revealing early plans for a compact SUV as well as a “new kind of pickup truck”.
For the first time, Musk also said Tesla could operate a ride-hailing network service, which would compete with existing services from Uber and Lyft. While Consumer Reports says that Autopilot is a misnomer, Musk said that “It would no more make sense to disable Tesla’s Autopilot, as some have called for, than it would to disable autopilot in aircraft, after which our system is named”.
Defending Tesla’s decision to deploy its partially autonomous system, in light of a May 7 crash that killed the driver, Musk said Autopilot is significantly safer than a person driving himself when used correctly. He also envisions a future where Tesla owners are able to share their vehicles with others in order to continue earning money when they aren’t personally using the vehicle.
“You will also be able to add your vehicle to the Tesla shared fleet just by tapping a button on the Tesla phone app and have it generate income for you while you’re at work or on vacation”, Musk wrote. “This dramatically lowers the true cost of ownership to the point where nearly anyone could own a Tesla”.
“By definition, we must at some point achieve a sustainable energy economy or we will run out of fossil fuels to burn and civilization will collapse”.
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“When true self-driving is approved by regulators, it will mean that you will be able to summon your Tesla from pretty much anywhere”, writes Musk in the post. In the second part of the master plan, Musk highlighted that the company is ready for mass production of Powerwall, while SolarCity is ready to provide highly differentiated panels.
