Tesla Unveils Lower-Priced Model 3 In Hawthorne
HAWTHORNE (CBSLA.com/AP) — Tesla Motors Thursday night unveiled its new, lower-priced Model 3 - the company's first affordable electric car for the masses.
CEO Elon Musk introduced the $35,000 electric car in front of a crowd of about 800 in Hawthorne and online via livestream.
The more affordable Model 3 will not go on sale until late 2017. But that did not stop thousands of buyers from putting their $1,000 deposits down to reserve the car. At least 115,000 pre-orders were placed in the first 24 hours, Musk said.
Buyers waited in long lines at Tesla stores in Southern California, around the county and overseas to put their deposits down. You can also reserve your car on line.
The Model 3 is less than half the cost of Tesla's previous models. The car is expected to have a range of at least 215 miles when fully charged, according to Musk.
He said the main goal is affordable, sustainable transportation. He boasted that the Model 3 can go from zero to 60 mph in 6 seconds.
Prototypes shown Thursday night looked like a shorter version of Tesla's Model S sedan. The Model 3 has a panoramic glass roof and an elongated hood. It seats five adults and has the same large touchscreen dashboard as other Teslas.
It also has Tesla's suite of semi-autonomous driving features, including automatic lane changing and lane keeping.
The Model 3 is the most serious test yet of 13-year-old Tesla's ability to go from a niche player to a full-fledged automaker. It could be the car that finally makes electrics mainstream or consumers could continue to be skeptical that electrics will work for everyday use.
Musk said Tesla will expand its stores and its fast-charging Supercharger stations globally in order to support the Model 3. He said the company plans to double its stores worldwide to 441 by the end of 2017, and it will double its Superchargers to 7,200. Tesla will also add thousands of its so-called destination charging stations at hotels and other locations.
Right now, Tesla sells two vehicles: The Model S sedan, which starts at $71,000, and the Model X SUV, which starts around $80,000. But a lower-priced car was Musk's longtime goal. Musk said the Model S and Model X, along with Tesla's first car, the discontinued Roadster sports car, helped Tesla make the money to invest in the Model 3.
"We needed to figure out how we, as a tiny company with very few resources, could make a difference," he said.
Tesla lowered the cost of the car, in part, by making cheaper batteries. The company previously assembled its battery packs with cells made in Japan by Panasonic Corp. But Tesla and Panasonic are building a massive, $5 billion factory in Nevada which will supply batteries for the Model 3. Tesla said the scale of the factory will lower the cost of its battery packs by 30 percent.
The Model 3 puts Tesla within reach of millions more customers.
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