With Tesla’s long awaited $35k Model 3 finally available for order and the company hitting production targets, the company is ready to make even more headlines as Elon Musk pulls the wraps off the Model Y this Thursday night. While Elon Musk is no joke in the industry, despite his random, often hilarious tweets, his following for the company he has created cannot be understated. Thousands of people will be live streaming the event to see the next “Apple” of cars this Thursday with much excitement. While Model Y is the main announcement of the night, given his track record, Elon Musk is sure to have some surprises up his sleeve. Here is what one might expect from Thursday’s announcement.
Of course the obvious big news of the night will be Model Y, the brand’s newest crossover based off the Model 3s basic architecture. Given that this will be the high volume “affordable” small crossover in the brand, don’t expect gullwing doors to make an appearance as it does in the Model X. Instead, one can expect a vehicle very much resembling a baby X, with an interior based heavily off the Model 3’s, having no physical controls outside the large center touchscreen and steering wheel. Due to its presence as a crossover, expect large storage volume behind the second row, as is in the Model X, and enhanced visibility due to higher ride height and large glass windows and roof structure. The Model Y is speculated to be priced from around $40k and will be produced, eventually, at the Tesla Gigafactory. Elon has, of course, had his bit of fun on the media for those daring enough to attempt enhancing his teaser shot of the new vehicle, displaying “Nice Try” on the bumper, reinforcing the humor everyone has come to know and love from the CEO.
Surprisingly, the Model Y may not be the most exciting news from the event though. Musk is always quick to pull a fast one, last time dazzling audiences by showing a preproduction model of the upcoming Tesla Roadster at the Semi truck reveal in November of 2017. This time around, we don’t expect much less. It would be nice to see a more production ready version of this vehicle, and while bets may be on the table for this, a new contender may be teased this time around.
In the past few months Rivian has been steeling the spotlight for being the first electric vehicle brand to show off its pickup truck. While Tesla has plans to have a mass produced pickup, nobody knows what it looks like, and currently Rivian has stolen the headlines in this area. It is quite possible that Elon will look to steal the attention back by teasing Tesla’s future pickup, which many expect to be just as classy, durable, and show stopping as Tesla’s other vehicles.
For the tech geeks out there, an autopilot announcement can also be expected, given Elon’s recent talks on the system being operational for fully autonomous driving within the next year or two. Tesla has been learning a lot from its current vehicles on the road, and has developed algorithms that will enable deep thinking and that other systems are yet to function with. Elon has referred to these other vehicles as those that rely on “ if-then” coding statements, during which vehicles are taught to perform certain actions based on predefined situations. Teslas will be enable to think deeply and perform a better performance despite no LIDAR system that scans and maps environments in 3D, unlike other autonomous vehicles in development. Assuming this system works as performed, autopilot could make headlines by the end of the week.
Apart from these two potential surprises, expect the usual talk of company performance and future outcasts for the company. Tesla is certainly building and maintaining momentum with its current models, and with more to come, Elon Musk is expected to keep the car “S3XY” for many years to come.
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