The Electric: Musk Warns Rivals They Will Regret Not Making Fully Autonomous EVs

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has staked the company’s future more clearly than ever on autonomous vehicles, saying Tesla would not make a driver-controlled car costing $25,000. In remarks to analysts Wednesday evening, he urged rivals to follow Tesla’s example and develop their own autonomous vehicles, but offered few new details on Tesla’s strategy. 

Multiple media outlets, including The Information, have reported for months that Musk earlier this year canceled Tesla’s long-planned $25,000 car, known as the Model 2, without publicly announcing the decision. But his remarks to analysts seemed to be the first time he publicly acknowledged that Tesla would not build such a car. Rather, he and Lars Moravy, vice president of vehicle engineering, said the company would sell some of its current cars—presumably the Models 3 and Y—for less than $30,000 after federal tax credits starting the first half of next year.

Investors had been pushing Tesla to build the Model 2 to accelerate revenue growth since the company has not released a major new vehicle since the Model Y in 2020. But Musk used surprisingly robust third-quarter results, disclosed just before the call Wednesday, to bat away the pressure.

Tesla reported a surprising 17.1% gross profit margin, excluding $739 million in regulatory credits it sold to other carmakers. That beat the 14.9% consensus of analysts polled by Visible Alpha, a software subsidiary of S&P Global Market Intelligence. Musk also predicted that Tesla would sell a record number of electric vehicles this year, defying forecasts by numerous analysts—including us—that the company would sell fewer EVs than it did in 2023. The results propelled Tesla shares up 12% in after-hours trading.

To surpass its 2023 sales of 1.8 million EVs, Tesla will have to sell more than 516,000 cars in the fourth quarter, which would be a record, but Musk said the automaker would do so. Then he doubled down: At a time other automakers are lowering their sales projections, he predicted that Tesla’s EV sales will grow by 20% to 30% next year, meaning by as many as 2.3 million units.

In response to a question about when consumers could expect a normal $25,000 EV, as opposed to a two-seat Robotaxi without a steering wheel or pedals, Musk responded, “We’re not making a non-Robotaxi.” Another Tesla executive added, “All our vehicles today are Robotaxis.”

Musk then said, “We’ve made very clear that the future is autonomous electric vehicles,” adding, “I think this should be frankly blindingly obvious at this point that that is the future.” Musk said other automakers have not accepted this, “and it will accrue to their detriment in the future.”

The earnings call was the first time analysts had a chance to question Musk about the Robotaxi and the Model 2 since Tesla’s “We, Robot” event on Oct. 10, when he unveiled the autonomous car, along with the company’s humanoid robot, Optimus, as we reported last week. Investors and analysts complained after the event that Musk had been light on detail.

But he kept Wednesday’s call tightly scripted, releasing a few more details about the Robotaxi, Optimus and the company’s in-house battery, the 4680, and leaving only about five minutes for questions in the scheduled hourlong call. The company allowed only two analysts to ask questions, neither of which resulted in more detail. It felt like Musk was running out the clock.

In a note to clients, William Stein, an analyst with Truist Securities, asked, “Where’s the beef?” He said Musk had failed to offer more detail on Tesla’s full–self-driving software, on new vehicles it promised to release in the first half of next year or on Optimus. “Similar to our views post-Robotaxi day, we were left expecting more,” he said.