Tesla in the news...

Remember the post about that fantastic Tesla electric car awhile back? I think it was like one of my first posts. Anyway, I find it interesting that they are back in the news again. It would appear that six figure electric sports cars just aren't selling like they hoped they would in this economy. Go figure... Tesla has had to do some pretty major reorganization because of it.

Tesla is creating a pretty interesting and more practical application for their high tech cars. It is sort of Dodge Magnum-esque, but if it will put down the power and speed of an internal combustion engine, then I'm sure it will sell. Right now all we know is that it is said to go 225 miles on a single charge and will cost upwards of $60,000.


One of the holdups in getting this car on the road is the fact that Tesla is waiting on a federal loan guarantee for their plant in San Diego. In fact, one of the reasons they have been mentioned again recently is because they just closed their Detroit location and told all their employees to move to San Jose if they want to continue working for Tesla. We're hearing that approximately 90% of the office was simply let go, and the remaining employees have to make their way to the San Jose headquarters with no moving costs covered, no increase in salary and no help getting rid of their old homes. Fortunately, the real estate market in Detroit is red-hot, and the cost of living is about the same in San Jose.... right?

The relevant section from the Tesla pink slip blog-post-of-death below:

"There will also be some headcount reduction due to consolidation of operations. In anticipation of moving vehicle engineering to our new HQ in San Jose, we are ramping down and will close our Rochester Hills office near Detroit. Good communication, tightly knit engineering and a common company culture are of paramount importance as Tesla grows."

That's right folks, "good communication" is key.

And do you want to know the real reason for the lcoation in California? Click here if you really want to read the whole press release, but the bottom line is that the Governator is giving a significant tax credit to anybody investing in zero emission vehicle technology in California. So since Tesla is creating entirely electric cars, this makes plenty of sense for them. Sure they would love to have their entire organization in one place, but that isn't the real reason they pulled out of Detroit. They left Detroit so they could get the tax credit for the work they were doing out there by doing it in California. Yes, that was a great way to stimulate the economy in California, but what about all of the jobs that are going to be lost in other places because those states aren't giving the tax credit. Wouldn't it make sense for all states to offer the same thing? Why wouldn't Michigan offer a tax credits for auto manufactuers investing in ZEVs? Crazy...