Tesla

Tesla, Inc. (formerly Tesla Motors, Inc.) is an American electric vehicle and alternative energy company based in Palo Alto, California. The company specializes in electric vehicle manufacturing, battery energy storage from home to grid scale and, through its acquisition of SolarCity, solar panel and solar roof tile manufacturing.

Founded in July 2003 by engineers Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning as Tesla Motors, the company’s name is a tribute to inventor and electrical engineer Nikola Tesla. The next three employees were Ian Wright, Elon Musk, and J. B. Straubel, all of whom are named as co-founders of the company.  Musk, who formerly served as chairman and is the current CEO, said that he envisioned Tesla Motors as a technology company and independent automaker, aimed at eventually offering electric cars at prices affordable to the average consumer. In February 2017, Tesla Motors shortened its name to Tesla, Inc.

Tesla operates multiple production and assembly plants, such as: its main vehicle manufacturing facility at Tesla Factory in Fremont, California; Giga Nevada near Reno, Nevada; Giga New York in Buffalo, New York; and Giga Shanghai in Shanghai, China. Its main products include the Model S, Model 3, Model X, and Model Y cars, and the Powerwall, Powerpack, and Megapack batteries. It also produces and sells solar panels, solar roof tiles, and some related products.

After 11 years in the market, Tesla ranked as the world's best-selling plug-in and battery electric passenger car manufacturer in 2019, both as a brand and by automotive group, with a market share of 17% of the plug-in segment and 23% of the battery electric segment. Tesla global vehicle sales increased 50% from 245,240 units in 2018 to 367,849 units in 2019. In 2020, the company surpassed the 1 million mark of electric cars produced. The Model 3 ranks as the world's all-time best-selling plug-in electric car, with more than 500,000 delivered.

Tesla has never had a profitable year; however, it has had several individually profitable quarters, most recently the quarters ending September 2018, December 2018, September 2019, December 2019, and March 2020. On July 1, 2020, Tesla reached a market capitalization of US$206 billion, surpassing Toyota to become the world's most valuable automaker by market capitalization.

## History

Founded as Tesla Motors, Tesla was incorporated on July 1, 2003 by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning. The founders were influenced to start the company after GM recalled all its EV1 electric cars in 2003 and then destroyed them, and seeing the higher efficiency of battery-electric cars as an opportunity to break the usual correlation between high performance and low mileage. The AC Propulsion tzero also inspired the company's first vehicle, the Roadster.

Ian Wright was the third employee, joining a few months later. The three went looking for venture capital (VC) funding in January 2004, and connected with Elon Musk, who contributed US$6.5 million of the initial (Series A) US$7.5 million round of investment in February 2004, and became chairman of the board of directors. Musk then appointed Eberhard as the CEO. J.B. Straubel joined in May 2004 as the fifth employee. A lawsuit settlement agreed to by Eberhard and Tesla in September 2009 allows all five (Eberhard, Tarpenning, Wright, Musk and Straubel) to call themselves co-founders.

Musk took an active role within the company and oversaw Roadster product design at a detailed level, but was not deeply involved in day-to-day business operations. Eberhard acknowledged that Musk was the person who insisted from the beginning on a carbon-fiber-reinforced polymer body and that Musk led design of components ranging from the power electronics module to the headlamps and other styling. Musk received the Global Green 2006 product design award for his design of the Tesla Roadster, presented by Mikhail Gorbachev, and he also received the 2007 Index Design award for his design of the Tesla Roadster.

From the beginning, Musk consistently maintained that Tesla's long-term strategic goal was to create affordable mass market electric vehicles. Tesla's goal was to start with a premium sports car aimed at early adopters and then moving into more mainstream vehicles, including sedans and affordable compacts.

Musk's Series A investment round in February 2004 included Compass Technology Partners and SDL Ventures, as well as many private investors. In February 2006, Musk led Tesla's Series B US$13 million investment round which added Valor Equity Partners to the funding team. Musk co-led the third, US$40 million round in May 2006 along with Technology Partners. Tesla's third round included investment from prominent entrepreneurs including Google co-founders Sergey Brin & Larry Page, former eBay President Jeff Skoll, Hyatt heir Nick Pritzker and added the VC firms Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Capricorn Management, and The Bay Area Equity Fund managed by JPMorgan Chase. The fourth round in May 2007 added another US$45 million and brought the total investments to over US$105 million through private financing.[citation needed] In January 2010 Tesla received a US$465 million loan from the U.S. Department of Energy, which it repaid in 2013.

On June 29, 2010, Tesla Motors launched its initial public offering (IPO) on NASDAQ, the first American car company to do so since the Ford Motor Company had its IPO in 1956.

For the year 2019, Tesla posted a loss of US$862 million on total revenues of US$24.6 billion.

On January 10, 2020, Tesla become the most valuable American automaker to ever exist, with a market capitalization of US$86 billion.

On January 29, 2020, Tesla became the world's second most valuable automaker, with a market capitalization of US$104 billion, passing Volkswagen's US$84 billion. On July 1, 2020, Tesla reached a market capitalization of US$206 billion, surpassing Toyota's US$202 billion to become the world's most valuable automaker by market capitalization.

## In Game

In the game, we will introduce a new semi-trailer but there is no chassis version of the truck is "Elara".