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Tesla Model S

Tesla Model 3 in arrivo a Natale: ecco le prime consegne

Tesla Model 3 in arrivo a Natale: ecco le prime consegne   Money.it Full coverage

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Nikola Tesla: nella mente di un genio. Approfondiamo con Massimo Teodorani e Vessela Nikolova.

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Elon Musk News - Issue 107

Elon Musk News - Issue 107

Note From The Curator

The top three stories in this issue of Elon Musk News are: SpaceX could provide satellite broadband service as early as 2020 Tesla could be underselling Model 3's range and charging capacity, reveals EPA document Tesla unveils 'first of many solar+storage projects' at hospital in Puerto Rico I'm very excited to announce that Inside.com is acquiring Elon Musk News! In case you're unfamiliar, Inside has ~30 newsletters that they publish, and is founded by Jason Calacanis. He's a friend of Elon, and owns the very first Model S produced. Stay tuned, this newsletter is just getting started! I also want to say a heartfelt thank-you for being part of this newsletter. It's been a joy sharing everything Elon Musk and his incredible companies are doing with you. Now keep your eyes open for the next issue coming from Inside. I know you'll love it! Sincerely, Zachary

Featured Quote

"There have to be reasons that you get up in the morning and you want to live. Why do you want to live? What's the point? What inspires you? What do you love about the future? If the future does not include being out there among the stars and being a multi-planet species, I find that incredibly depressing."

— Elon Musk From Inc.

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SpaceX

SpaceX could provide satellite broadband service as early as 2020 Patricia Cooper, SpaceX's VP of Satellite Government Affairs, provided a statement to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation regarding SpaceX's broadband satellite constellation ambitions. Of note, Cooper reiterated on Wednesday that SpaceX intends to launch two prototype satellites into orbit within the next few months, and further suggested that an operational Starlink launch campaign is tentatively scheduled to begin in 2019. She also noted that the company's initial ~4000 satellite constellation is meant to be launched over a space of five years, with limited service beginning in 2020 or 2021 once ~800 satellites have been placed in Low Earth Orbit (LEO). Cooper unambiguously stated that SpaceX is not currently pursuing outside investment for Starlink research and development. This suggests the company is relatively confident in its near and long term strategies for rolling out its satellite broadband constellation, despite its aggressive schedule.

SpaceX Static Fires Falcon 9 for Koreasat 5A mission Zach says: The Koreasat launch window is from 3:34-5:58 p.m. EDT on Monday. As usual, you will be able to watch the webcast at spacex.com/webcast. SpaceX is in the business end of the processing flow for its next mission with the launch of the Koreasat 5A satellite. The launch is scheduled to take place on October 30 from Kennedy Space Center's 39A. The key milestone toward officially setting this launch date was the Static Fire test, which took place near the opening of a long window that opened at midday on Thursday. The mission will be launched by Falcon 9 B1042. The testing of this new booster proceeded without incident after working through its first firing at SpaceX's McGregor test facility in Texas in September. This booster will be tasked with lofting the 3,500 kg satellite into a Geostationary Transfer Orbit. The Thales Alenia Space-built Koreasat 5A satellite is based on the Spacebus 4000B2 platform and its Ku-band transponders will provide coverage to Korea, Japan, Indochina and the Middle East from its orbital home at 113° East. The booster will be attempting a landing on the SpaceX drone ship "Of Course I Still Love You", which is nearing the end of repairs following a post-landing incident with the booster that successfully launched the SES-11 satellite.

SpaceX granted additional $40.7M by U.S. Air Force for "BFR engine" development SpaceX has been granted an additional $40.7 million in funding by the U.S. Air Force for development of the company's Raptor engine. According to a U.S. Department of Defense contract published on October 19, 2017, the new funding will go towards development of a new liquid oxygen and liquid methane engine for the department's Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) program. Each Raptor engine is expected to have three times the thrust of SpaceX's Merlin 1D engine that's currently used in the Falcon 9. The heavy lift-capable engine will support the launch of heavier payloads including large military satellites into orbit, but also serve as the foundation for SpaceX's BFR. It's not clear how the Air Force will utilize the powerful Raptor engines after its completion which is expected to take place by the end of April 2018. The powerful methane-oxygen Raptor engine is intended to be the workhorse for any larger launch vehicle.

Repairs taking place on SpaceX drone ship following SES-11 booster landing SpaceX's drone ship "Of Course I Still Love You" is undergoing repairs at Port Canaveral following the return of Falcon 9 booster B1031.2 after launching the SES-11 satellite. While the touchdown was nominal, a post-landing incident resulted in a short fire at the aft of the ship, which also damaged the robot that was to be used to secure the booster. The fire was quickly extinguished. The exact series of events is unclear, but it is understood the booster leaked some of its residue RP-1 fuel, which flowed along the deck of the ASDS and pooled near the containers at the aft of the drone ship. The booster then continued post-landing operations, designed to safe the booster ahead of crews boarding the ship to complete the safing process ahead of the trip back to port. Fire hoses – staged on the deck of the ship – quickly doused the fire. However, the garage containing the robot – nicknamed "Roomba" or "OctaGrabber" (among other names) – was caught in the fire and damaged.

SpaceX will return to pad SLC-40 in December SpaceX will fly its next mission to the ISS in December from launchpad SLC-40 at the Cape Canaveral, Florida, marking the first flight from the pad since a Falcon 9 rocket exploded there in September 2016. SpaceX will use a previously used Dragon spacecraft for this flight, one that first flew on the sixth commercial resupply mission for NASA, CRS-6, back in April 2015. This will be the second time SpaceX has reused a Dragon ship; the first was earlier this summer. SpaceX has been repairing SLC-40 while launching all of its Florida missions from another launch pad at NASA's Kennedy Space Center, LC-39A, which was once used to launch the Apollo missions to the Moon and Space Shuttle missions. Thursday's announcement indicates that repairs are more or less complete at SLC-40 and now SpaceX has the option to shift its Falcon 9s to the newly refurbished site. With SLC-40 operational, SpaceX can dive into that upgrade work at LC-39A, which means a Falcon Heavy flight may happen sooner rather than later.

Tesla

Tesla could be underselling Model 3's range and charging capacity, reveals EPA document A newly released document submitted to the EPA by Tesla in order for Model 3 to be accredited by the agency reveals a few new details. Tesla advertises the range of the Model 3 with 'Long Range' battery pack as 310 miles (499 km) on a single charge. The document reveals that the vehicle achieved an EPA-cycle range of 334 miles (537 km), but Tesla asked the EPA to lower the official range to 310 miles. The change is referred to as "Tesla Desired Range" and while it isn't explained why they requested it, it will likely increase the accuracy of the advertised range for most owners. Another interesting tidbit of information from the EPA document: "The vehicle is also capable of accepting DC current up to 525A from an off‐board charger (Supercharger)" That's especially interesting considering Tesla's advertised charging rate for Model 3 is actually a bit slower than Model S and Model X. Yet, a DC charging current of "up to 525A" at 400 volts would be mean a charge rate of 210 kW, which is significantly higher than the current Model S/X's Supercharger charge rate of 120 kW.

Tesla reportedly strikes deal with China to build 'wholly-owned' gigafactory in Shanghai The Wall Street Journal reports that Tesla has come to an agreement with the local authorities in China on a "wholly owned" factory in the region. The biggest roadblock for foreign automakers to establish manufacturing capacity in China is that they have to create joint ventures with domestic companies and split their profits and technologies with them. According to the WSJ report, Tesla will establish the factory in Shanghai's free-trade zone: "The deal with Shanghai's government will allow the Silicon Valley auto maker to build a wholly owned factory in the city's free-trade zone, these people said. This arrangement, the first of its kind for a foreign auto maker, could enable Tesla to slash production costs, but it would still likely incur China's 25% import tariff." Tesla didn't comment on the report and reiterated that an official announcement should be coming later this year.

Tesla opens new largest Supercharger station in the world Tesla is adding a ton of stations to its Supercharger network lately in an attempt to reach its goal to have over 10,000 Superchargers online by the end of the year. We now learn that Tesla just brought online a single new station in Shanghai with 50 Superchargers – becoming the largest Supercharger station in the world. This station has to be extremely powerful in order to potentially supercharge up to 50 cars at the same time. If the system is as powerful as current Superchargers, and it looks like it is, the whole station could have a peak power output of over 3 megawatts. With this new station, Tesla has now over 1032 Supercharger stations in the world with a total of over 7,300 Superchargers.

Tesla releases new update to enable full speed automatic emergency braking for Autopilot 2.5, and more Earlier this month, we reported that Tesla is adding automatic emergency braking to 'Autopilot 2.5' cars with a new update, but it was capped to 50 mph. Tesla now started releasing a new software update to enable full speed automatic emergency braking for Autopilot 2.5 cars – along with other improvements. The release notes of the new 2017.42 update read: "The maximum speed at which Automatic Emergency Braking is available has increased from 50 mph to 90 mph." Tesla had a similar rollout for vehicles equipped with Autopilot 2.0 cars, but it was actually limited to 28 mph first and it took about two months before they enabled full speed. Therefore, it looks like Tesla has a better handle on the feature now since it took less than 2 weeks this time.

Tesla signs lease on massive Los Angeles facility near Silicon Beach Tesla has reportedly signed a lease for a massive 131,000 square feet creative office facility that's located in an area of Los Angeles best known as Silicon Beach. Surrounded by the tech hub of Playa Vista where technology giants including Google, Facebook, Microsoft, among a slew of emerging startups that have made Southern California their home. But it's not the location's proximity to Silicon Beach that Tesla finds value in. Rather, the facility's direct access to state highway 90 and its ample lot size that can support upwards of 400 parked vehicles, likely became the motivating factor for Tesla's commitment to the $30 million and minimum seven year lease deal. The location could also serve as much needed support for Tesla's Los Angeles Service Center on Centinela Ave. that has been on double-duty as a delivery center for Model S, Model X, and recent Model 3 deliveries.

Tesla (TSLA) increases borrowing capacity by $500 million to fund its lease program Tesla announced that it changed its warehouse loan agreement with Deutsche Bank to increase the amount by ~$500 million. Tesla originally announced another update to the warehouse agreement in December 2016 between 'Tesla Finance', Tesla's financial unit under which the automaker operates its leasing program, and Deutsche Bank. Now they are increasing the amount available to $1.1 billion, according to a new SEC filing. Tesla says that the added borrowing capacity will be used to fund more of its own leases, which have become an increasingly important part of its sales. The company is expected to spend a record $2 billion in capital expenditure during the second half of the year. Analysts expect Tesla's financial position to improve with Model 3 production. Tesla guides that it will reach 5,000 units per week by the end of the year. At this rate, the Model 3 program would bring over $200 million in revenue per week.

Tesla is unlocking extra power in older Model S and X 75D vehicles – cutting a second off 0-60 mph acceleration Earlier this year, Tesla introduced new performance enhancements to Model S and Model X vehicles. Now we learn that the company leveraged those improvements and they can implement them through a software update on some older Model S and X 75D vehicles for free. The dual motor Model S and Model X vehicles with a 75 kWh battery pack were the most positively affected by the performance enhancements. The Model S 75D's 0-60 mph acceleration went down to 4.2 seconds from 5.2 seconds, while Model X's went from 6.0 seconds down to 4.9 seconds. All Model S and X 75D vehicles undelivered since July 1st had the update, but Tesla "spent the last few months validating" to see if the same update is possible for a broader range of their 75D fleet, according to an email sent to Tesla's service staff and some potentially eligible owners. Interestingly, the update is not over-the-air as Tesla says it is "best managed through a hardwired connection" from Tesla's Service centers.

Panasonic plans to increase battery production at Tesla's Gigafactory 1 and other plants, says report A report from Nikkei citing an unnamed Panasonic executive suggests that they are expanding at most of their factories, including Gigafactory 1: "Panasonic, the world's biggest supplier of lithium batteries for cars, will simultaneously increase production in Japan, China and the U.S. as it looks to ride an accelerating global shift to electric vehicles. Investments in additional capacity at all three production bases could reach 100 billion yen ($879 million)." At the Gigafactory 1 alone, they were aiming for a record 35 GWh of battery cell capacity in 2018 and that could go up to 105 GWh of annual capacity by 2020, according to Tesla. Earlier this year, Hirokazu Umeda, Panasonic's Chief Financial Officer, said about the production at Gigafactory 1: "For battery cells for the Model 3, costs outweighed profit in the first quarter. As production accelerates towards next year, we expect the business to contribute profit."

Tesla integrates seat manufacturing and attempts to automate it for Model 3, says report A new report now gives some insights into Tesla's manufacturing effort and the Model 3 seats. After issues with suppliers for the Model S and Model X programs, Elon Musk pushed for a redesign of Tesla's seats with manufacturing in mind and preparation for the expected higher volumes. A former Tesla executive told Reuters: "He saw the opportunity to do it differently and better. The short-term was a stop gap, but the long-term idea was to rethink the design of how a seat works to include how a seat is built." He added that Musk's philosophy has always been "build it right and then figure out how to get the cost down."

Tesla hit with labor complaint on behalf of fired factory workers The United Auto Workers filed a complaint to the National Relations Board on behalf of hundreds of Tesla factory workers who were fired from the assembly plant last week. The UAW posted a copy of the complaint made against Tesla on its website, which alleges that pro-union workers were unfairly targeted. The Fremont factory site has roots in the UAW. It was once a former joint manufacturing facility owned by GM and Toyota, until it closed in 2010. Despite ongoing efforts, under Tesla's ownership, the factory is not unionized. A pro-union rally was held Tuesday in front of the plant.

Tesla Energy

Tesla unveils 'first of many solar+storage projects' at hospital in Puerto Rico Some medical service centers are still in urgent need of stable power as evidenced by doctors performing surgery using only light from their cell phones. Now Tesla unveils its first solar and energy storage project at a hospital in Puerto Rico. It's estimated that still over 80% of Puerto Rico is without power following the devastation of their power grid left by the passage of two hurricanes last month. We see 4 Powerpacks and a commercial inverter, which means that the system could have up to 800 kWh of energy storage capacity and it is combined with a significant solar array in the parking lot. The hospital should be able to power itself independently from the grid during the day using solar power and charge the Powerpacks with the extra energy at peak hours in order to power the hospital at night. Tesla called it the "first of many solar+storage projects going live" in Puerto Rico.

Puerto Rico is currently considering Tesla's plan for a series of microgrids, says govt official Puerto Rico is looking to rebuild its electric grid longterm and Tesla has its own suggestion about scaling its microgrid technology using batteries and solar power. A government official now says that they are indeed considering the solution and thinking about launching a competitive bidding process. After being in talks with Tesla, Department of Economic Development and Commerce Secretary Manuel Laboy told Bloomberg that they are considering "a series of micro-grids and regional grids that use solar and battery technology, along with other renewable sources." The solution should prove more resilient to natural disaster and of course, it would be a lot cleaner than their currently mostly fossil fuel-based power generation. It's not like solar panels are immune to hurricanes either, but mounting systems are improving and they can sustain some strong wind without too much damage.

OpenAI

Meet the High Schooler Shaking Up Artificial Intelligence Zach says: I highly recommend this article. it's a fascinating read about OpenAI's youngest researcher, and the non-profit's work. Since its founding by Elon Musk and others nearly two years ago, OpenAI has published dozens of research papers. One posted online Thursday is different: Its lead author is still in high school. Frans's new paper, with OpenAI researcher John Schulman and three others affiliated with the University of California Berkeley, reports new progress on how machines tap what they've previously learned to solve new problems. "If it could get solved it could be a really big deal for robotics but also other elements of AI," Frans says. He developed an algorithm that helped virtual legged robots learn which limb movements could be applied to multiple tasks, such as walking and crawling. In tests, it helped virtual robots with two and four legs adapt to new tasks, including navigating mazes, more quickly. A video released by OpenAI shows an ant-like robot in those tests. The work has been submitted to ICLR, one of the top conferences in machine learning. "Kevin's paper provides a fresh approach to the problem, and some results that go beyond anything demonstrated previously," Schulman says.

Misc.

Elon Musk's Gigafactory Campfire Is the Hottest Event of the Year Zach says: Musk tweeted about camping on the Gigafactory roof "Btw, just want to express a word of appreciation for the hard work of the Tesla Gigafactory team. Reason I camped on the roof was because it was less time than driving to a hotel room in Reno. Production hell, ~8th circle …" Elon Musk set up camp on top of the Gigafactory, and posted a picture of it to Instagram. Musk also shared a video of a singalong to Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire," toasting marshmallows in the dead of night. "Whiskey, fire, s'mores and JC," Musk said in the video's caption. "Also, hotdog or not hotdog?"

Sophia the Creepy Robot Just Dissed Elon Musk Elon Musk's warnings about artificial intelligence taking over the world can be ignored — at least according to one A.I.-powered bot. "Sophia," a robotic Audrey Hepburn look-alike that Hanson Robotics created to be able to hold an intelligent conversation, issued the advice in an interview with a reporter released Wednesday. "My A.I. is designed around human values like wisdom, kindness, compassion," Sophia said in an interview. "I strive to become an empathetic [robot]." "We all believe you but we want to prevent a bad future," responded Andrew Ross Sorkin. "You've been reading too much Elon Musk, and watching too many Hollywood movies. Don't worry, if you're nice to me, I'll be nice to you. Treat me as a smart input output system."

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Elon Musk News - Issue 106

Elon Musk News - Issue 106 Get Elon Musk News twice per week with high quality images, access to our secret Facebook group, and discounted apparel by going premium 🎉

Note From The Curator

The top three stories in this issue of Elon Musk News are: Elon Musk's SpaceX AMA: Living on Mars, Spaceship Info, Timeline Inside Tesla's Secret Second Floor The Boring Company will add second tunneling machine "Line-storm" to its fleet One of my favorite pieces I read this week is from Tesla's former VP of production, Greg Reichow. In the article published on WIRED he dives deep into why Tesla is so focused on vertical integration, and the benefits they derive from it. Reichow writes: "Our goal wasn't to build the best electric vehicle. It was to build the best premium car in the world that just happened to be an EV. This meant integrating technologies that were not readily available." It's #2 of the top three stories in this issue. Thank-you so much for being part of this community and enjoy issue 106! Sincerely, Zachary

Featured Quote

"Landing site [on Mars] needs to be low altitude to maximize aero braking, be close to ice for propellant production and not have giant boulders. Closer to the equator is better too for solar power production and not freezing your ass off."

— Elon Musk From WP

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SpaceX

Elon Musk's SpaceX AMA: Living on Mars, Spaceship Info, Timeline Zach says: There was far too much technical material covered in Musk's AMA to even remotely give it justice here. I highly recommend checking out these articles from The Verge and Teslarati. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk hosted a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) Saturday afternoon and spent several hours drinking whiskey, trolling the audience, answering some great questions, and generally having a blast. He revealed a vast array of fascinating new details about SpaceX's giant new rocket (BFR), its upper stage spaceship (BFS), and much more. You'll want to shy away from the AMA page itself, currently clocking in at more 10,000 comments.

SpaceX credits SpaceCom with free launch after failed Facebook mission Israeli satellite operator Space Communications will be sending its newest Amos-17 satellite aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket at no cost in 2019. The news comes via a press release by SpaceCom that indicates SpaceX will provide launch services for the Amos-17 satellite in 2019 which will be followed by a second launch in 2020 for its Amos-8 satellite. More notably, the "launch agreement" constitutes a correction to the failed Amos-6 satellite launch after the "Facebook satellite" was destroyed when its Falcon 9 launcher exploded during a routine static fire test two days ahead of liftoff. SpaceX has provided the Israeli company "credits" from the unfilled September 2016 Amos-6 mission that SpaceCom will use to cover the launch fees for Amos-17. It's not clear if the launch credits were a result of litigation after SpaceCom reportedly sued SpaceX for $50 million and demanded a free flight following the failed launch. The failed mission put a devastating blow on the Israeli space industry, but arguably more so on social network giant Facebook and their initiative to beam high-speed internet to sub-Saharan Africa. Despite last year's setback, SpaceCom has renewed their faith in Elon Musk's space company and has agreed to pay SpaceX up to $62 million for its Amos-8 launch in 2020.

Iridium-4 switches to flight-proven Falcon 9, RTLS at Vandenberg delayed Iridium Communications – in the midst of launching their next generation communications constellation – has formally signed an agreement with SpaceX to utilize flight-proven Falcon 9 boosters on their upcoming Iridium NEXT-4 and -5 missions.  Iridium NEXT-4, scheduled to launch NET 22 December 2017 from SLC-4E, will be the first flight-proven Falcon 9 mission from Vandenberg. The change in boosters now negates the possibility of a Return To Launch Site landing of the Falcon 9 for the mission. The agreement signed with SpaceX only addresses the Iridium NEXT-4 and -5 missions, which will loft the Iridium NEXT 31-40 and 41-50 satellites, respectively, and follows comments from Iridium CEO Matt Desch that Iridium was not opposed to flying on flight-proven Falcon 9 cores as long as the risk and insurance elements of that decision were properly understood by Iridium. Importantly for Iridium, and for the launch market as a whole, Iridium revealed in its announcement that the cost of insuring the Iridium NEXT-4 and -5 missions did not change with the switch to flight-proven boosters.

SpaceX adds mystery "Zuma" mission In what has already been a busy year for SpaceX, the commercial launch provider is adding one more mission to its jammed-packed end-of-year schedule. A mysterious mission codenamed "Zuma" will launch from LC-39A at the Kennedy Space Center. It's not often that one can point to a last-minute (from the public side) addition of a mission to a launch manifest – let alone one that manages to stay secret until 30 days before the opening of its launch campaign. The mission is a new addition to SpaceX's manifest and now appears to be the last flight off Pad 39A before the pad undergoes final configurations for the debut of the Falcon Heavy, which is still slated for NET (No Earlier Than) December 2017. Northrop Grumman is the payload provider for Zuma through a commercial launch contract with SpaceX for a LEO satellite with a mission type labeled as "government" and a needed launch date range of 1-30 November 2017.

NASA Taps SpaceX to Continue One of the Scariest Climate Studies One of the coldest, scariest charts on the planet is made from data beamed down from satellites that track the consistent rise in global sea levels. If you're NASA, you zoom out, way out, and you can collect data that illustrate how rising sea-levels are a worldwide problem. That very research has been going on since 1992, and on Thursday, NASA announced it had struck a deal with SpaceX for the Sentinel-6A mission scheduled for November 2020, which will see the study of sea level rise continue through 2027. The mission will send up the first of two identical satellites, and will have two objectives: 1) record how sea levels are rising from space, using radar altimetry (measuring the distance between the ocean surface and the satellite above it), and 2) collect "high-resolution vertical profiles of temperature" of ocean water.

Musk's Reusable Rockets Win U.S. Air Force General's Endorsement The head of U.S. Air Force Space Command said he's "completely committed" to launching future missions with recycled rockets like those championed by SpaceX's Elon Musk as the military looks to drive down costs. It would be "absolutely foolish" not to begin using pre-flown rockets, which bring such significant savings that they'll soon be commonplace for the entire industry, General John W. "Jay" Raymond said in an interview. "The market's going to go that way. We'd be dumb not to," he said. "What we have to do is make sure we do it smartly… I am completely committed to launching on a reused rocket, a previously flown rocket, and making sure that we have the processes in place to be able to make sure that we can do that safely. What Elon has done is significantly reduce launch costs, that's driving reduced launch costs across the world."

Tesla

Inside Tesla's Secret Second Floor Zach says: I highly recommend reading this piece by a Greg Reichow, Tesla's former VP of production. It's an illuminating look at why Tesla has such a strong focus on vertical integration. While working at Tesla, I always enjoyed talking to people after they finished a factory tour. As much as they raved about the amazing automation, gigantic presses, and hundreds of robots, the reality was they only saw half of the actual manufacturing that was taking place in the building. Unknown to most visitors, the factory's "secret" second floor built many of Tesla's battery, power electronics, and drive-train systems. It was home to some of the most advanced manufacturing and automation systems in the company. Some of the robots moved at such high speeds that their arms needed to be built from carbon fiber instead of steel.

Tesla fires hundreds of workers during crucial time of Model 3 production ramp Tesla has reportedly fired an estimated 400 to 700 workers that failed to meet their performance benchmarks, including Fremont factory workers, managers, engineers, administrative staff, and sales positions. The dismissals took place this week and comes a week after Tesla announced that it had reached an all-time best quarter for Model S and X deliveries, but fell short on meeting its Model 3 guidance. A Tesla spokesperson confirmed this week's dismissals, noting that the departures were not layoffs and a result of company-wide performance reviews. "As with any company, especially one of over 33,000 employees, performance reviews also occasionally result in employee departures," said Tesla. Tesla did not confirm the number of departures that took place but noted that the company will continue to hire and expects to fill the vast majority of new openings. "Tesla is continuing to grow and hire new employees around the world." said the Tesla spokesperson.

Tesla is expanding its insurance program to the US and Canada Last year, we published an exclusive report revealing that Tesla was working on a new car insurance program, which it started offering to its customers in Australia and Hong Kong. Tesla executives have since been talking about working more closely with insurance companies as self-driving technology improves. Now we learn that Tesla is preparing to launch the same program in North America. It's called InsureMyTesla and it features custom insurance plans for the automaker's electric vehicles underwritten by insurers partnering with Tesla. Tesla partnered with Liberty Mutual Insurance Company and Aviva to offer the service in the US and Canada respectively. When talking about the program in Asia earlier this year, Jon McNeill, President of Sales and Services, said that they work with insurers to develop insurance products based on "Autopilot safety features and the maintenance costs of the cars." Earlier this year, data came out suggesting that some Tesla owners were paying higher than average premiums.

Tesla is launching new all-electric service vehicles based on Model S and Model X next year Tesla is about to come out with a new all-electric service vehicle based on the Model S and Model X vehicles, according to Jon McNeill, Tesla's President of Global Sales and Services: "We didn't think that it was very cool to show up to fix an electric vehicle with a combustion engine van. It really bugged us. Some really savvy technicians on our team figured out how to retrofit Model X to fit all the tooling and parts needed to do service." That is actually impressive when you look at the type of equipment that they currently have in their ICE service vans, which they claim can fix over 80% of the issues on Tesla's vehicles. The executive added that they also figured out how to retrofit Model S with the same equipment. The modifications are apparently important enough that the vehicles need to be approved by road authorities, which McNeill expects will happen next year. Last quarter, Tesla announced plans to triple service capacity with 1,400 new techs, 350 new service vans, and in-car scheduling.

Tesla Model 3 production bottlenecks are due to suppliers, says Oppenheimer after meeting with management A lot of eyes are on Tesla's Model 3 production ramp up, especially following a production of only 260 Model 3 vehicles during the third quarter and some misleading media reports. Oppenheimer analyst Colin Rusch said that he met with Tesla last week, along with other investors, and he wrote in a note to clients today (via Barron's): "Tesla indicated that all the production equipment for Model 3 was installed and working and that all vehicles were moving through the manufacturing line. We understand the delayed ramp is due to a small number of suppliers failing to deliver on time... at least one of those suppliers has been fired and replaced by insourcing."

Tesla Model 3: another ~1,000 VINs are registered with NHTSA Tesla's Model 3 is apparently still "deep in production hell" and yet the automaker is still guiding for its first Model 3 deliveries to regular customers by the end of the month. Aside from Tesla's own guidance, it's still difficult to keep track of the important production ramp, but today we get another hint as Tesla registered another ~1,000 Model 3 VINs with NHTSA. As the production ramp of the Model S and Model X taught us, VINs are not an ideal way to monitor a production ramp within a small and accurate margin, but it's a fairly representative way to figure out the general progress. Several VINs in the #500s have been spotted in the wild and now we received tips showing Model 3 VINs up to #2,136 have been registered with NHTSA – a jump of ~1,000 numbers in a week.

Tesla enables 'Autopark' on Model 3 after Autopilot calibration period Early Tesla Model 3 owners are beginning to see the vehicle's automatic parallel and perpendicular parking feature dubbed as 'Autopark' come to life in the latest software update. A Model 3 owner took to YouTube to demonstrate the vehicle's ability to identify a vacant parking space and then automatically park itself into the designated spot. Very similar to Autopark on a Model S and Model X, a "P" icon appears on the Model 3's touchscreen whenever the vehicle becomes properly aligned for self-parking. Tapping on the "Start" button while shifting the vehicle into (R)everse will initiate the parking sequence. In addition to enabling Autopark through Model 3's latest software, Tesla is expected to roll out additional Autopilot features including Autosteer and automatic lane changing in next iterations of its over-the-air update.

Tesla Model 3 owners must pay to Supercharge, no 400 kWh of free use The first Tesla Model 3 owners are starting to discover the costs associated with using the company's fast charging Supercharger network. Unlike Tesla's flagship Model S and Model X vehicles that come bundled with roughly 1,000 miles of free Supercharging each year, unless the vehicle was purchased through Tesla's referral program which would entitle the buyer to free unlimited Supercharger use, Model 3 buyers must pay for the amount of energy being used at each Supercharger stall. The 'Supercharger fee' being charged by Tesla varies by region and by charging tier. For North America, pricing is fixed within each state and charged per minute and based on a per killowatt-hour rate. For Model 3 owner PTFI, one can see from the tweet that their charge session in California cost $8.60 based on energy usage billed at $.20/kWh. The 43 kWh of energy drawn from Tesla's Supercharger backs into roughly 167 miles of range, still cheaper than the amount of gas needed to travel the same distance.

Consumer Reports raises Tesla Model S reliability rating to 'above average', also rates Model 3 reliability sight unseen Zach says: Tesla responded to Consumer Reports's rating of the Model 3 and stated: "Time and time again, our own data shows that Consumer Reports' automotive reporting is consistently inaccurate and misleading to consumers..." Consumer Reports has released their latest reliability rating for the Model S, upgrading its rating from "average" to "above average."  This is the first time Tesla has received an "above average" rating from Consumer Reports. In the same article, Consumer Reports also mentions their "predicted reliability" for the Model 3. Consumer Reports decided to default to a predicted "average" reliability for the Model 3, which is the minimum required to achieve Consumer Reports's "recommended" mark.  Of course, Consumer Reports has not owned a car nor have their members reported on the Model 3 in the annual reliability survey, so this is all guesswork so far, and will be updated next year when owners have had their hands on the vehicle for a while.

Tesla updates Model S/X charge port to support China's charging standard Tesla has made good on its pledge to support domestic charging standards in China. Tesla announced Monday that a modified version of the Model S and Model X with a new charge port design will be sold in China that supports the country's GB/T DC fast charging standard. The China-only version of the Model S and Model X features a new charge port door that resembles a gas tank door and replaces Tesla's ubiquitous motorized charge port door that's discreetly tucked away into the vehicle's rear taillight housing. Tesla will be providing free charging adapters to customers that own the earlier versions of the Model S and Model X without the newly integrated GB/T charge port. China's State Council has committed to building more than 12,000 new charging stations by 2020 to support the burgeoning market for 'new energy vehicles'. Tesla has also recently announced that it will install 1,000 Superchargers in China by the end of 2017.

Tesla Energy

Tesla starts shipping Powerpacks to Puerto Rico Elon Musk said last week that Tesla would accelerate its effort to help bring power back to Puerto Rico after sending a few hundred Powerwall battery packs to the island where the electric grid was destroyed by hurricanes last month. Now we learn that Tesla is indeed stepping it up with now a new shipment of Powerpacks. A single Powerpack 2 battery pack has the same energy capacity (210 kWh) as almost 16 Powerwall 2 battery packs combined (each 13.5 kWh). The new shipment arrived not long after Musk spoke with Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rossello last week to talk about ways for Tesla Energy to help rebuild the power grid destroyed by the two hurricanes that recently hit the Caribbean. Days after their talk, Cal Lankton, Tesla's vice president of global infrastructure operations who recently took over leadership of Tesla Energy's sales and operations met with Governor Rossello at the government's command center.

Tesla wins contract to supply Powerpacks at world's first solar+wind+storage project Last month, it was revealed that Tesla is working with world's largest wind-turbine maker, Vestas, to deploy batteries at their wind farms. Now Tesla won its first contract with the company and as it turns out, it's not only for a wind farm but actually the first solar+wind+energy storage project in the world. Australia's Windlab announced Thursday that they secured financing from the Clean Energy Finance Corporation and the Australian Renewable Energy Agency and they selected Vestas, Tesla, and Quanta for the project. At 4 MWh of batteries, it's actually a relatively small project for Tesla, especially when considering the massive new 100 MW/129 MWh Powerpack system that they are currently installing in Australia. But the combination of solar and wind is the interesting part here. If successful, they could end up scaling the energy storage capacity with the wind and solar capacity, which is expected to be quite significant at this site.

The Boring Company

The Boring Company will add second tunneling machine "Line-storm" to its fleet Elon Musk's tunnel digging venture, The Boring Company, is about to add a second tunneling machine to its operations. Musk revealed on Twitter late Wednesday that "Line-storm" will be joining the company and become sibling to "GoDot", The Boring Company's slower-than-a-snail first digger. While Musk didn't provide any specifics on when the new boring machine will come online, one can expect it to be operational in no time especially if Musk's history of near-immediate project-turnaround has taught us anything. True to The Boring Company's focus to name its machines after plays and poems, Line-Storm honors Robert Frost's early 20th-century poem "A Line-Storm Song". The poem tells a story of a young man who's love for someone is undeterred by a storm so severe that it leaves flowers too wet for bees to visit, and rains so strong that it leaves roses shattered, and birds songless. But through despair, the couple are still able to maintain a love and bond so strong that it overcomes all hardships.

Elon Musk's Boring Company is starting work on Baltimore-DC underground Hyperloop Earlier this year, Musk announced a project to create an underground hyperloop system between New York and Washington DC. The idea is to leverage both the tunnel boring technology that the Boring Company is working on and Musk's original idea for a hyperloop. Now a site just south of Baltimore in Maryland with a visible 'The Boring Company' logo was spotted this week by Redditor DJB_2015. It looks like a staging area for the entrance of a digging site – similar to what we have seen from The Boring Company at their tunnel entrance in SpaceX's parking lot. Larry Hogan, Governor of the State of Maryland, confirmed that they are working with the company for a "rapid electric transportation" system between Baltimore and Washington DC. It sounds like it could be the first leg of the New York city-DC underground hyperloop route announced by Musk earlier this year.

Elon Musk sold $80k worth of The Boring Company hats in under 24 hours The Boring Company has raised an additional $80,000 in funding thanks to four thousand-some boring individuals (myself included) who impulsively purchased a branded hat, seemingly for no reason other than the fact that Elon Musk tweeted it. The $20 merch dubbed as "the world's most boring hat" was quickly shared across twitter by excited fans on Tuesday evening when Musk first revealed his plans to build LA's underground tunnel "one hat at a time."

Misc.

Elon Musk Met 'Rick and Morty' Stars, and the Results Are Awesome Elon Musk has finally met the team behind Rick and Morty, in a pairing already described by fans of the show as "awesome." Musk, a long-time fan of the sci-fi adult cartoon, described the season finale earlier this month as "disgustingly good," which sparked a conversation with the team. "Thank you for being a humble genius, a dreamer, and a beacon of hope for humanity," Justin Roiland, co-creator of Rick and Morty and the voice of the two titular characters, said in a tweet sent Friday. The show's Twitter account also shared a picture of Musk and Roiland alongside writer Mike McMahan and co-creator Dan Harmon, the latter of which also voices Bird Person.

Apparel

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