Tesla Motors
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REV: JANUARY 24, 2014
ERIC VAN DEN STEEN
Tesla Motors
“Tesla is in California, so it is not April Fool’s yet!” tweeted Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla Motors, around 10 PM PT on March 31, 2013. “First profitable Q for Tesla thanks to awesome customers & hard work by a super dedicated team”1 he had tweeted a few minutes earlier. And indeed, on May 8,
Tesla announced a net income of more than $10mln on $560 mln in sales.2 Tesla had outsold both
Nissan and GM in electric cars in the U.S.3 Its Model S had sold more than the BMW 7 and Audi A8 combined.4 Tesla raised its Model S sales target for its first full year from 20,000 to 21,000 cars.5 Over the next three months, its stock price …show more content…
In most cars, the transmission powered the front wheels. Such front-wheel drive cars had more conservative handling and were cheaper to make than rear-wheel drive cars, such as BMW and
Mercedes, which required a costly and space-taking connection between the motor in the front and the rear wheels.