Tesla Semi production begins with Pepsi getting the first deliveries
Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla, announced on Twitter on Thursday that the long-delayed all-electric semi truck is now in production, with the first deliveries starting in December.
During a sensational event in November 2017 staged in Hawthorne, California, on the grounds of the automaker’s design studio and Musk’s other company, SpaceX, the automaker unveiled an all-electric Class 8 truck prototype, dubbed Tesla Semi.
The announcement came more than a year after Tesla initiated a program to create trucks. Jerome Guillen, a former Daimler executive who joined the firm in 2010, oversaw the program. Guillen resigned from Tesla in 2021, a short time after his role was narrowed from the president of the entire company’s automotive industry to that of the head of Tesla’s heavy haulage division.
The Auto company had initially anticipated launching the semi-truck in December 2019. The program, however, had several delays.
Due to supply chain issues and the scarcity of battery cells, Tesla postponed manufacturing of the Semi truck program last year after Guillen’s departure until 2022, the firm stated in its second-quarter financial report.
The Semi’s engineering was complete as of January 2021, and deliveries were scheduled to start that month. Even still, Musk warned that the supply of battery cells might constrain the Semi’s production capacity.
A tweet from Mr. Musk is below…
Excited to announce start of production of Tesla Semi Truck with deliveries to @Pepsi on Dec 1st! pic.twitter.com/gq0l73iGRW
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 6, 2022
Despite the delays, the business was nevertheless able to get $5,000 in reservations from a number of well-known businesses, including Anheuser-Busch, Pepsi, Walmart, and UPS. Pepsi, which placed a December 2017 order for 100 trucks, will be the first customer to get the cars, Musk tweeted.
Delivery to Pepsi is anticipated on December 1, according to Musk.
