Tesla Space #60: Did Elon really nazi this coming?

X OF THE WEEK

Elon being attacked internationally for something he “kind of did”?

We definitely did nazi this coming.

(sorry, just had to)

So the awkward Elon strikes again and you’ll probably have to yet again explain your grandma or that one uncle that Elon is, in fact, not actually saluting like the Nazis.

If you’re just waking up, this is the moment from Elon’s speech that got everyone buzzing:

Here is the moment on video. And what you won’t see on the news headlines, of course, is that Elon says “Thank you. My heart goes out to you." while doing this.

But of course, you already know how the media goes:

By the way, if you really want to go there, there’s also something called ancient Roman Salute out there that you can learn about here (this is what nazis went and made ‘their own’ later on). There goes another day thinking of the Roman Empire 🤷‍♂️ 

Elon hasn’t commented too much on the topic so far, other than also saying “Frankly, they need better dirty tricks. The “everyone is Hitler” attack is sooo tired 😴”

Of course, why Elon couldn’t see this sh*tstorm coming about this (or did he) is beyond me, but I guess he has always played on the line of controversy anyway. Or perhaps way outside of that line, really.

Here is the full talk from Elon on the Presidential Parade. Really too bad about the hand gesture optics, Elon seemed really fired up on that speech, worth a listen.

Ok, now you should have all the details we do, and can draw all the conclusions you want to based on the real video. Let’s get to the Tesla stuff, shall we?

TESLA, GLOBALLY

Tesla has filed a patent about manufacturing LFP cathode material — another step towards Tesla producing LFP cells in-house. To note, that’d be the active material powder used to coat the metal foils that go into the battery.

Drew Baglino (Former SVP of Powertrain and Energy at Tesla) commented: “The (Tesla) patent describes a more scalable, lower capital investment, and lower process cost means of making LFP; Would be prudent for the new LFP supply chains developing in the US and Europe to adopt this approach when localizing. Fully scaled can be lower cost than un-tariffed LFP from China.”

Great comment, and I’d add — China is also increasingly trying to keep the LFP production in China and possibly blocking the production elsewhere in near future (due to them owning nearly all LFP-related patents. So this would mean MAJOR geopolitical advantages for Tesla in the non-China markets.

Now, the story doesn’t stop here — our friend Jordan from the Limiting Factor, found some breadcrumbs proving Tesla has run LFP cathode production tests in the past 3 years:

“One of the test batches was 100 tons, which by my estimate is a 15-20 MWh batch of cathode material, or enough for several hundred vehicles.”

Just to recap if the word LFP is foreign to you here — it stands for Lithium iron phosphate, which is a battery chemistry widely used in EVs since the past few years, competing with the NMC (Nickel Manganese Cobalt) ones.

While a LFP battery is lower in efficiency compared to NMC, it is significantly cheaper to produce, has a higher cycle life (means less degradation, longer lifespan), doesn’t have cobalt in it (which is a conflict metal), and is less prone for thermal runaway (aka the violent battery fires)

Quick bites:

• Tesla is reportedly entering the Saudi Arabian market within months.

• 🇨🇦 Tesla has lowered the price of its basic Autopilot feature in Canada by -65% from CA$ 4,000 to CA$1,400 for pre-2019 Teslas that didn't have it as standard.

• Tesla has extended their free lifetime Supercharging for new Foundation Series Cybertruck orders to January 31st.

• Tesla is discounting its Model Y inventory in the US, which might have something to do with the slower month of January or… the Model Y refresh inbound?

• Tesla sold more Model Ys in the US in Q4 2024 than the total combined sales of all EV models sold by Toyota, VW, Rivian, Porsche, Mercedes, Kia, Honda, Ford, Volvo, Fiat and Lexus during the same period.

• Tesla Japan is offering 5 years of free Supercharging for new Model 3 and Model Y orders for people who take delivery by March 31, 2025.

• Phillippines President thanks Tesla for launching in the country: “Tesla, thank you for believing in the Philippines. Your investment in the country extends beyond transportation and infrastructure; it is in the people and potential of the country.”

• The SEC has (yet again) sued Elon in federal court over an alleged securities violation — saying Elon "committed securities fraud in 2022 by failing to disclose his ownership in Twitter and buying shares at “artificially low prices.”

• Also, a former employee named Mike Tully sues Tesla for not being able to remotely work anymore despite having the original agreement to do so when he joined. Part of Elon’s everyone-back-to-office with very few exceptions move, no doubt. You’ll read “this threatened his marriage” on the headlines, of course, for that sweet extra negative flavor.

• Semi-infrastructure: Tesla, along with three other industry partners, backed an Illinois EPA application that won $100 million in funding to build EV heavy-duty truck charging stations across the state. Not to be confused with the $100M project in California and Texas that Tesla didn’t get.

• Tesla has reportedly built the first Model Y “Juniper” at Giga Berlin — the vehicle will stay within the factory and will be signed by the 12,000 Tesla workers who are employed at the plant.

• Turns out the Cybertruck off-road lightbar costs $2,500.

• Tesla, for the first time, introduced inventory discounts in the US for brand new Cybertrucks.

FSD & SOFTWARE

Here’s a little interaction from Tesla that tells us Tesla is working on a ‘more comprehensive’ camera washer system.

Tesla Insurance may soon offer a FSD discount for insurance, and take usage into consideration, based on the latest breadcrumbs on the Tesla iOS app update.

Tesla is finally also about to implement (no specific date yet) Ultra-wideband (UWB) support for Android phones, something it added for iOS almost a year ago. Ultra-wideband allows for much more accurate phone tracking, leading to new features and a more reliable phone key. This will also mean hands-free trunk opening and automatic frunk opening for the eligible models.

Fun fact: In 2024, Tesla shipped 300+ features to Tesla owners via free over-the-air software updates.

Tesla also launched some specific improvements in China, especially for navigation which now has options like “Least Congestion, “Lowest Tolls” or “Prefer Highways”.

As part of navigation improvements, approaching a highway service area in China will now automatically open an on-screen prompt, directing you to restaurants, convenience stores, and charging facilities within the service area.

The good thing is once it’s launched in China, us in Europe and US have hope too.

…on the road to FSD

I’ve been gathering some stories around the FSD improvements for you, but I haven’t been able to fit them all in the newsletter. Fixing this today, so expect some of these links also from previous weeks:

Elon said on an X live with Stagwell’s CEO Mark Penn at CES (at the 6:23 mark):

“We feel confident in passing the... basically being better than human driving in about 3 months. Basically Q2 of this year. We feel confident in passing... having a probability of accident that is better than the average experienced driver. And then it will keep going from there. Ultimately, I think it will be 10 times safer than a human driver and then 100 times safer, like it's... until the point where really it just won't crash. So, and that's happening this year with Tesla! And this is a software update to, you know, our cars!”

Some fun finds:

• Tesla ASS is now available in China. Here’s a video from an owner.

• Also, Elon’s patent for ASS was granted.

• Tesla Model Y on FSD V13.2.2.1 detects a school bus with its stop sign extended on wintery road, completely stops, then resumes driving after the bus’s red lights have turned off and the people are cleared from the road. No interventions or disengagements. Seems they’ve really solved the school bus stop-sign problem, as I’ve now seen about a dozen of such videos.

• Tesla FSD V13 Sets A New Record In Out Of Spec ADAS Challenge.

• Tesla FSD V13.3 is to improve highway speed and vehicle follow distance.

• FSD 12.6 is rolling out generally to AI3 (HW3) vehicles, here’s a great video.

• FSD Cannonball Record: Well detailed run of FSD v12.5.6.4 coast-to-coast, then drive cross country using FSD v13.2.2.

NVIDIA CEO, Jensen Huang on Elon: "He's working on some of the most important AI areas. xAI is working on foundation cognitive intelligence AI. Tesla is working on autonomous vehicles and Optimus for humanoid robotics. These three areas of AI are the most important areas of AI. I think he's working on exactly the right things.”

Also, Jensen on Tesla’s approach to self-driving:

“Elon has a great advantage because his AI factory for his cars is fantastic, it has a lot of Nvidia gear in it. His AV algorithms are incredible. It's the best in the world. He has a very large fleet of cars on the road that allows him to collect a lot of data. I think he's in a phenomenal position.”

Jensen also said on robotaxis and self-driving: “I predict that this is going to be the first multi-trillion dollar robotics industry.”

PS! shoutout to “edwi”, our reader who said we should talk more about FSD advancements.

MUSKONOMY

Here’s a very entertaining video tip: SoKrispyMedia has produced a 10-minute action video featuring Optimus: “Tesla Robots Fight Back”

SpaceX

SpaceX’s Starship rocket, the largest & most powerful rocket ever, took off for its 7th test flight. This aws the first launch of the next-generation Starship. Unfortunately, yet somewhat expectedly, it experienced a RUD (Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly) and the pieces were raining down the sky around Turks & Caicos like the autobots coming to visit their Tesla friends.

SpaceX team definitely still learned a lot from the flight test (here is the SpaceX statement after the flight), and another huge feat, they nailed the booster catch by Mechazilla for the second time!

Oh and also 24 years after the company’s founding, Jeff Bezos’ rocket company, Blue Origin, successfully reached orbit with its own rocket, the 320-foot-tall New Glenn, for the first time ever. Blue Origin did lose their first-stage booster, which was kind of expected for their first ever launch for this rocket.w

(SpaceX’s) Starlink

Starlink team has provided 1,350 free Starlink kits to fire departments and other disaster response organizations from Orange County to Malibu. “And since enabling our Direct to Cell satellites with TMobile, more than 120,000 text messages have been sent, allowing those in the impacted areas to reach loved ones, text 911 or receive emergency alerts.”

🇹🇻 Starlink is now available in Tuvalu, one of the most remote island nations in the world! This marks the 120th country, territory or other market

SpaceX is now offering a new Starlink plan in Australia for about $9 per month in an effort to pull in revenue from inactive customers. However, the plan caps the monthly data limit to a mere 5GB.

John Deere released JDLink Boost, a satellite connectivity solution with integrated Starlink to ensure customers continue seamless work in fields with little-to-none cellular coverage.

xAI

Grok now has a standalone app and website to use the service.