Project Redwood Aiming for 2025 Release
Tesla’s next generation electric vehicle project finally has a name, “Project Redwood”, and the company is hoping to get production started by mid-2025.
In an anonymously sourced report from Reuters on January 24th, Tesla has put out a “request for quotes” to suppliers to begin production on their new $25k vehicle platform in June of 2025, with volume production to likely start in 2026.
This was confirmed later that same day in a post-earnings call, where CEO Elon Musk stated that they will expect to begin production of its next-generation EV at their Texas gigafactory in the second half of 2025.
Production at Giga Texas will be followed by Giga Mexico and “Another factory outside of North America,” - likely Giga Berlin or Giga Shanghai - which will be decided later this year. However, Tesla has also expressed interest in building a new factory in India in a bid to lower costs further in their vehicle production - so that’s another potential location for this new vehicle.
Tesla is reportedly aiming for a manufacturing rate of about 10,000 units per week once volume production begins. While a steep estimate for a brand new vehicle, the innovative design of the Redwood platform will hopefully reduce production setbacks and allow for higher goals to be reached - and 10k per week isn’t too far off from the global production numbers set by the Models 3 and Y last year.
Tesla has been hyping this new platform since about 2020 - and more explicitly since the Investors Day presentation back in March 2023 when the vehicle was officially announced alongside the new gigafactory in Mexico.
It has been described as a cheap, utilitarian offering that could possibly take design cues from the Model Y and the Cybertruck’s futuristic look - but more importantly will allow Tesla to take another crack at their Robotaxi concept - which will be designed exclusively as an autonomous ride-hailing service vehicle.
Project Redwood is likely to be a game-changer within the EV market. A $25,000 per unit price point is unheard of outside of Asia - and Tesla is really focusing on reliability here.
The Reuters report even mentions that production models of the dependable Honda Civic are being torn down in-factory in order to replicate their cost-effective manufacturing while retaining the quality.
And this is a bit of a side note, but could Project Redwood have any connection with Redwood Materials? The company is run by Tesla co-founder JB Straubel, and is working to create a “circular battery economy” - using recycled materials to produce cheaper batteries.
Tesla and Panasonic also recently partnered with Redwood to build a $3.5 billion battery materials plant in South Carolina, - breaking ground for the project last week.
While this is just speculation, the name connection could link the two projects together, and using a battery made with mostly recycled materials as a standard for this new vehicle could help to further control costs.
Aside from that, though - Project Redwood is another eagerly awaited Tesla product, and 2024 will likely be filled with sightings of new prototypes.