For the first time in four years, Tesla has announced new vehicle designs.
The automaker recently announced three new models — a compact car, a passenger van, and a bus. The last passenger vehicle unveiled by the company was the Cybertruck in 2019, which is slated to be released this summer.
The reveal came over a month after Tesla's CEO Elon Musk left fans disappointed at his Investor Day event, in which he briefly showed a slide of two future disguised models. Not only were fans disappointed that no new vehicles were revealed, but many of them were also left skeptical of Musk's ability to deliver on certain aspects of his plans.
The tease came in a report published on April 5th. While the document mainly focuses on sustainability and the company's new battery strategy, as it is this technology that sets Tesla apart from its competitors, a chart in the section titled "Batteries for Transportation" shows statistics for three vehicles, all of which have yet to be named.
The compact vehicle and the bus will have 53- and 300-kilowatt-hour lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries, respectively, while the passenger van will have a 100-kilowatt-hour high nickel battery.
Most of the excitement is around the compact model, which is rumored to have a cost as low as $25,000. This is much less than that of Tesla's current cheapest car, the rear-wheel-drive Model 3, which starts at $42,990.
The new compact vehicle seems to align with Musk's mission to corner the mass market and also puts the pedal to the metal in the race to remain ahead of his rivals.
"The desire for people to own a Tesla is extremely high," Musk said at the Investor Day event. "The limiting factor is their ability to pay for a Tesla."
While there are no release dates listed for any of the potential new vehicles, Musk's quote may soon no longer be the case.
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