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Tesla Cybertruck Hotwheels is a glimpse of Elon Musk’s brilliant marketing strategy
Just like the upcoming all-electric Tesla Cybetruck, Hot Wheels and Mattel’s 1:10 scale model Cybertruck RC is sensational, selling out five hours after its website launched.
The toy for the big boys remote-controlled Cybertruck was unveiled during the Toy Fair 2020 at the Javits Convention Center in New York. The $400 scaled version of the Cybertruck instantly became the darling of the fair. Primarily designed for collectors, the RC Cybertruck comes with functioning headlamps and taillights, full suspension, all-wheel drive, and, of course, sports the eye-catching dystopian design of Elon Musk’s much-awaited pickup truck. The toy Cybertruck will also feature an operational tonneau, a telescoping tailgate and a loading ramp. It will even have a removable exterior so one can appreciate the interior design of the vehicle.
“The CyberTruck was unveiled November 21, 2019 and on the 22nd we went to work. We started looking at internet references and screen grabs and we mocked up our best stab for a prototype,” Director of Product Design at Mattel Gerry Cody said in an interview with Fatherly.
Mattel and Hot Wheels’ partnership with Tesla is not new by any means as the toymaker started with the Tesla Roadster. In fact, they have a toy Tesla Roadster on the dash of the electric sportscar that Musk sent into space. It has also created products based on the Model S, Model X, and Model 3.
The two companies know Tesla well to the point that they were allowed to produce a reusable broken window glass vinyl that toy collectors can put on their scaled-down Cybertruck.
“When we started building the prototypes, my team and I started asking: what are the features, what are the specs, and we thought about the glass. We weren’t sure what Tesla’s sensitivity was going to be regarding that moment,” Cody said. “We said ‘How about a reusable vinyl sticker?’ And they were into it. It’s not full-time, you users can take it on and off, but it’s something that’s just a great little detail.”
According to Cody, the Cybertruck RC is the fastest item for Mattel that zoomed past idea pitch to pre-sale in a matter of 90 days. They’re also amazed how the mini Cybertruck sold out so fast in a few hours.
Only serious toy collectors and Tesla fans would spend hundreds of dollars to get their hands on a scaled version of the Tesla Cybertruck and this further proves the dedicated following of the company within the electric vehicle community.
Elon Musk’s authenticity also reflects on how the company handles unexpected events such as the breaking of the Cybertruck’s windows during its unveiling. Tesla turned it to a marketing opportunity and even released a Cybertruck “bulletproof” t-shirt. A genius move.
Tesla’s collaboration with Mattel and Hot Wheels is a way to extend its showrooms to the rest of the globe. A child holding a 1:64 fast Cybertruck RC or a Tesla fan showcasing a 1:10 scaled model of the electric pickup truck can ultimately help spread the word about the vehicle and the company as a whole.
Of course, the limited-production Cybertruck Hotwheels RC went viral and built up more awareness about the real Cybertruck, which according to Elon Musk had 250,000 orders a few weeks after its unwrapping and roughly 500,000 preorders based on a recent take of an unofficial tracker created by Tesla fans.
Elon Musk said he is planning to give “every one of his SpaceX shares to every kid in America” in 2027, stating that “this will be the first of many.”
SpaceX went public earlier this year, and its stock price has been relatively stable since leveling off shortly after its IPO. Based on its current price, it’s a gift of just over $10 billion to children across the United States.
It appears to be closely related to President Donald Trump’s bank accounts for children, which were set up earlier this year as Trump Accounts.
Just hours earlier, Anthropic had announced the establishment of its Anthropic Public Benefit Fund, “a new wholly-owned entity dedicated entirely to public benefit.” Musk responded by stating he recommended “giving the shares directly to the public,” and that he would be doing it that way.
Just a little bit later, Musk said children across the U.S. would be getting a share from him:
Next year, I will give one of my SpaceX shares to every kid in America.
This will be the first of many.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 19, 2026
There are roughly 70 million children, meaning someone under the age of 18, in the United States, according to the Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics. Musk’s ownership of SpaceX stock shows he has around 849 million Class A shares of SpaceX stock, according to filings with the SEC.
Elon Musk revealed in a post on X that “Permits were impossible to get,” explaining the fate of The Boring Company’s most ambitious East Coast proposal.
The comment responded to a query about what became of his July 20, 2017 announcement that he had “just received verbal govt approval” for an underground Hyperloop connecting New York City, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C., capable of carrying passengers from the Big Apple to the Nation’s Capital in just 29 minutes.
The Boring Company receives verbal ‘approval’ to build NY to DC Hyperloop tunnel
The 2017 post, which envisioned city-center stations and multiple elevators in each city, sparked immediate scrutiny. Local and state officials in New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and D.C. said they had no knowledge of any approval. A White House spokesperson confirmed only “promising conversations” about the transformative infrastructure.
Musk clarified shortly after that there was “still a lot of work” to do for formal approvals.
@cybrtrkguy Permits were impossible to get
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 19, 2026
Limited progress followed, as Maryland Governor Larry Hogan’s administration issued a conditional utility permit and supported work near Fort Meade. In 2018, Washington, D.C., granted a preliminary permit for site preparation and excavation on a vacant lot at 53 New York Ave. NE in the NoMa neighborhood, which The Boring Company said could become a station.
A draft environmental assessment for a D.C.-Baltimore segment was released in 2019. Yet, by April 2021, the company had removed the project from its website, and the Federal Highway Administration reported receiving no indication of further interest. Communication with Maryland officials had ceased.
The full corridor would have required coordination among the District of Columbia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New York, the Federal Highway Administration, the Army Corps of Engineers, the National Park Service, and other agencies.
Environmental reviews under the National Environmental Policy Act, utility clearances, and approvals for novel infrastructure added to the overall complexity of the project and its approval.
Speculation on the permitting barriers centers around a few factors, but a multi-state, multi-level route involving unproven high-speed vacuum-tube technology inherently triggers exhaustive safety, environmental, and engineering reviews that can stretch for years, even for conventional projects.
There are also other elements, of course, like officials who may face political exposure if a privately funded, untested system encountered anything such as cost overruns, delays, or safety issues. On the outset of this project, there were limited things such as engineering plans or demonstrated technology maturity, which also added to the potential skepticism.
The East Coast vision for Boring Co., once framed as a privately funded revolution that could reshape Northeast travel, quietly ended without construction of the promised network. Musk’s recent statement frames the outcome as a regulatory impasse, unfortunate but not unexpected.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk took to his social media platform X on Sunday to remind everyone that the Roadster’s true meaning is not about company growth or adding dollars to shareholders’ pockets. Sometimes, you just do things because you can.
Following the Roadster’s epic unveiling event last Thursday, skeptics and critics of the company or the project itself came out to say that the vehicle is a pointless project because it is not geared toward growing the company, delivering supreme margins for profitability, nor does it contribute to the big picture of Artificial/Super Intelligence.
But that’s just the thing: Roadster is not meant to be some shareholder dream; it’s meant to be a vehicle that people buy just because it is something awesome, unique, and the first of its kind.
Tesla Roadster: Three configs, one can fly, 0-60 in 0.8 seconds
Musk had to remind those who are skeptical about the Roadster’s importance to the company mission that while it is not a major contributor to Tesla’s long-term goals, it is something that is being built just because it can be:
“Optimus and Cybercab will be the vast majority of Tesla’s value. The only things that will scale to incredible size (K2 and beyond) economically are super intelligence, robots, solar power, and mass to space. And, of course, if you have the first two, the rest will follow. But Roadster is super cool, so we’re doing it anyway.”
Musk has said on many occasions that Optimus would be the project that would make up the vast majority of Tesla’s value in the coming years.
Robotics will be a major focus of Tesla over the coming years, especially as Musk believes Optimus will enable work to be optional for humans and will enable what he calls “High Universal Income.”
Optimus and Cybercab will be the vast majority of Tesla’s value.
The only things that will scale to incredible size (K2 and beyond) economically are super intelligence, robots, solar power and mass to space.
And, of course, if you have the first two, the rest will follow.
But Roadster is super cool, so we’re doing it anyway.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 18, 2026
Cybercab will be a passive income opportunity for owners, Musk and Tesla have said for a very long time, as a fleet of self-driving vehicles will operate within a ride-hailing Robotaxi service that won’t require a human driver to be present.
Tesla investors are more than enthusiastic about the company’s future projects, at least from a general consensus perspective. However, it is important to note that the Roadster is a fun and cool project that pushes the boundaries of what people thought was possible for an automobile.
What we saw last week was the first true example of a flying car, and despite the backlash about how it might not contribute to Tesla’s grand ambitions, it’s okay to have fun sometimes, too.
Elon Musk will give ‘every kid in America’ a SpaceX share in 2027
Elon Musk reveals why Boring Co’s biggest East Coast project never happened
Tesla CEO Elon Musk reminds everyone about Roadster’s true meaning
SpaceX reveals how its 1 Million AI satellite network will work and prevent space collisions
Tesla Roadster: Three configs, one can fly, 0-60 in 0.8 seconds
