For years, the image associated with electric cars has been something along the lines of a souped-up golf cart – small, not too fast and often not too pretty. Tesla Motors is looking to blow those stereotypes out of the water. The company's all-electric Roadster looks and (allegedly) drives like something from Bruce Wayne's garage rather than Bruce the caddy's. However, the company hasn't gone without its share of troubles – from persistent transmission problems causing the high-priced sports car to self-destruct, to the persistent economic troubles of the automotive sector causing the company to bump up the pre-order price, even for orders already placed.
Still, the company is single-handedly changing the face of the electric car, a claim validated when it stole the spotlight at January's Detroit auto show. To find what's going on now and what's up next, Vehix went straight to the source and spoke with Tesla's Rachel Konrad.
Vehix: How have the events of the last 12 months changed plans for Tesla's future?
Konrad: Here's one example: Last year, we were planning to raise $100 million from venture capitalists, and we planned to use that money in part to build a new assembly plant for our upcoming Model S sedan, an all-electric four-door slated for production in the second half of 2011. However, venture capital dried up when the markets tanked last year. So instead, Tesla closed a $40 million round that will get us to profitability this summer. To expand and build the Model S assembly plant, we hope to rely on a $350 million federal low-interest loan through the Department of Energy. This means we don't have to go back to the venture capital market, which became very tight last year and may not loosen up for several quarters.
Vehix: Make the case for why Tesla deserves federal dollars, and what the benefit will be for the company and customers.
Konrad: Tesla is not applying for any "bailout" funds that Chrysler and GM have received, and Tesla does not need the DOE low-interest loan to survive; the company is expected to be profitable this summer. If the company's highest ambition were to make money building high priced sports cars, it would be there soon. However, the company's ambitions go far beyond this. Tesla wants to advance the electrification of personal transportation, and to do that we must make more affordable cars, mass produced in far greater quantity than the relatively exotic Roadster, which is a paradigm-shifting product, but more importantly serves as proof-of-concept for less expensive cars such as the Model S and others. So although Tesla doesn't need federal low-interest loans to survive, it does need them to expand.