Investor's Corner
Manufacturing Expansion Provides 2015 Narrative for Tesla
Tesla’s supercharging buildout receives its share of publicity these days as the company builds out an electric highway for multiple countries. However, Tesla’s massive manufacturing expansion resonates as the underlying narrative for Tesla in 2015 for investors, along with a very important Model X release.
Part of investors’ fascination with Tesla is the lack of legacy costs and perceived future advantage in electric car production over traditional automakers at scale. Another big advantage for Tesla over traditional automakers is the evolution of manufacturing technology and software, and the lack of legacy control or operation architectures as an obstacle. Sophisticated industrial networking at the factory floor can communicate with SAP level enterprise business layers and drive efficiencies now. Things have changed.
Over the last ten years, factory manufacturing has integrated higher processing speeds for machinery equipment and added a lot of sensors. Everybody has read or heard about the the Internet of Things, but in the factory space it’s known as the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT). This sensor explosion has been evolving quickly for manufacturers since the 2008 downturn.
However, it’s been a struggle for legacy manufacturers and automakers. That’s why the Fremont plant expansion for the Model X and Model 3 is really advantageous for Tesla. They have a clean manufacturing slate.
So what’s happening in Fremont? Just four months ago, German-based Durr AG announced that it had shipped its 9,000 robot to the Fremont plant. In the release, Durr said that as many as 100 paint, 48 handling and 26 sealing robots went to Tesla’s recently finished paint center, as Musk refers to it.
The paint center has two sealing, primer and top coat lines, which can paint as much as 500,000 bodies per year. That’s the key number.
“This is quite a huge capital cost for us and the new paint center is actually set up to be able to do 10,000 cars a week,” says Musk at a recent shareholder meeting. “So, this paint center is intended to be able to match the 2020 production level (500,000/annually) that includes the Model 3.”
Musk also mentioned that the new Lathrop, Calif. castings and machining center for the Model S will allow Tesla “to expand our vehicle capacity and allocate more space for vehicle final assembly.”
Tesla recently carved out more room at its Fremont plant for its SX body production line. The SX line will be able to switch to the either the Model X or S vehicle, depending on demand. “The new line will have more automation and greater flexibility and we should be able to do three times more than we’re able to do in the current body line,” says Musk.
Of course, this is just the car side. The Tesla Gigafactory is another component to meet future demand for its car and energy side of the business. Just last week around 8 pm eastern time on Friday, Tesla quietly announced that it took out a credit line of “$500M, five-year, credit facility via five banks and it has the option to increase the credit facility’s size to $750M.”
Most investors would admit there’s a good deal of risk in this strategy. However, Elon Musk and his talented team know this is the only strategy to enable high-volume manufacturing for a mass-market electric car. So the rest now comes down to execution.
*Below is an interesting car assembly application via ABB robotics, see video below. Love to see a Tesla video like this, enjoy!
Elon Musk
Tesla stock gets latest synopsis from Jim Cramer: ‘It’s actually a robotics company’
“Turns out it’s actually a robotics and Cybercab company, and I want to buy, buy, buy. Yes, Tesla’s the paper that turned into scissors in one session,” Cramer said.
Tesla stock (NASDAQ: TSLA) got its latest synopsis from Wall Street analyst Jim Cramer, who finally realized something that many fans of the company have known all along: it’s not a car company. Instead, it’s a robotics company.
In a recent note that was released after Tesla reported Earnings in late January, Cramer seemed to recognize that the underwhelming financials and overall performance of the automotive division were not representative of the current state of affairs.
Instead, we’re seeing a company transition itself away from its early identity, essentially evolving like a caterpillar into a butterfly.
The narrative of the Earnings Call was simple: We’re not a car company, at least not from a birds-eye view. We’re an AI and Robotics company, and we are transitioning to this quicker than most people realize.
Tesla stock gets another analysis from Jim Cramer, and investors will like it
Tesla’s Q4 Earnings Call featured plenty of analysis from CEO Elon Musk and others, and some of the more minor details of the call were even indicative of a company that is moving toward AI instead of its cars. For example, the Model S and Model X will be no more after Q2, as Musk said that they serve relatively no purpose for the future.
Instead, Tesla is shifting its focus to the vehicles catered for autonomy and its Robotaxi and self-driving efforts.
Cramer recognizes this:
“…we got results from Tesla, which actually beat numbers, but nobody cares about the numbers here, as electric vehicles are the past. And according to CEO Elon Musk, the future of this company comes down to Cybercabs and humanoid robots. Stock fell more than 3% the next day. That may be because their capital expenditures budget was higher than expected, or maybe people wanted more details from the new businesses. At this point, I think Musk acolytes might be more excited about SpaceX, which is planning to come public later this year.”
He continued, highlighting the company’s true transition away from vehicles to its Cybercab, Optimus, and AI ambitions:
“I know it’s hard to believe how quickly this market can change its attitude. Last night, I heard a disastrous car company speak. Turns out it’s actually a robotics and Cybercab company, and I want to buy, buy, buy. Yes, Tesla’s the paper that turned into scissors in one session. I didn’t like it as a car company. Boy, I love it as a Cybercab and humanoid robot juggernaut. Call me a buyer and give me five robots while I’m at it.”
Cramer’s narrative seems to fit that of the most bullish Tesla investors. Anyone who is labeled a “permabull” has been echoing a similar sentiment over the past several years: Tesla is not a car company any longer.
Instead, the true focus is on the future and the potential that AI and Robotics bring to the company. It is truly difficult to put Tesla shares in the same group as companies like Ford, General Motors, and others.
Tesla shares are down less than half a percent at the time of publishing, trading at $423.69.
There are a lot of Tesla bulls out there who have astronomical expectations for the company, especially as its arm of reach has gone well past automotive and energy and entered artificial intelligence and robotics.
However, some of the most bullish Tesla investors believe the company could become worth $100 trillion, and CEO Elon Musk does not believe that number is completely out of the question, even if it sounds almost ridiculous.
To put that number into perspective, the top ten most valuable companies in the world — NVIDIA, Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, Amazon, TSMC, Meta, Saudi Aramco, Broadcom, and Tesla — are worth roughly $26 trillion.
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Cathie Wood of ARK Invest believes the number is reasonable considering Tesla’s long-reaching industry ambitions:
“…in the world of AI, what do you have to have to win? You have to have proprietary data, and think about all the proprietary data he has, different kinds of proprietary data. Tesla, the language of the road; Neuralink, multiomics data; nobody else has that data. X, nobody else has that data either. I could see $100 trillion. I think it’s going to happen because of convergence. I think Tesla is the leading candidate [for $100 trillion] for the reason I just said.”
Musk said late last year that all of his companies seem to be “heading toward convergence,” and it’s started to come to fruition. Tesla invested in xAI, as revealed in its Q4 Earnings Shareholder Deck, and SpaceX recently acquired xAI, marking the first step in the potential for a massive umbrella of companies under Musk’s watch.
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Now that it is happening, it seems Musk is even more enthusiastic about a massive valuation that would swell to nearly four-times the value of the top ten most valuable companies in the world currently, as he said on X, the idea of a $100 trillion valuation is “not impossible.”
It’s not impossible
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 6, 2026
Tesla is not just a car company. With its many projects, including the launch of Robotaxi, the progress of the Optimus robot, and its AI ambitions, it has the potential to continue gaining value at an accelerating rate.
Musk’s comments show his confidence in Tesla’s numerous projects, especially as some begin to mature and some head toward their initial stages.
Elon Musk
Tesla director pay lawsuit sees lawyer fees slashed by $100 million
The ruling leaves the case’s underlying settlement intact while significantly reducing what the plaintiffs’ attorneys will receive.
The Delaware Supreme Court has cut more than $100 million from a legal fee award tied to a shareholder lawsuit challenging compensation paid to Tesla directors between 2017 and 2020.
The ruling leaves the case’s underlying settlement intact while significantly reducing what the plaintiffs’ attorneys will receive.
Delaware Supreme Court trims legal fees
As noted in a Bloomberg Law report, the case targeted pay granted to Tesla directors, including CEO Elon Musk, Oracle founder Larry Ellison, Kimbal Musk, and Rupert Murdoch. The Delaware Chancery Court had awarded $176 million to the plaintiffs. Tesla’s board must also return stock options and forego years worth of pay.
As per Chief Justice Collins J. Seitz Jr. in an opinion for the Delaware Supreme Court’s full five-member panel, however, the decision of the Delaware Chancery Court to award $176 million to a pension fund’s law firm “erred by including in its financial benefit analysis the intrinsic value” of options being returned by Tesla’s board.
The justices then reduced the fee award from $176 million to $70.9 million. “As we measure it, $71 million reflects a reasonable fee for counsel’s efforts and does not result in a windfall,” Chief Justice Seitz wrote.
Other settlement terms still intact
The Supreme Court upheld the settlement itself, which requires Tesla’s board to return stock and options valued at up to $735 million and to forgo three years of additional compensation worth about $184 million.
Tesla argued during oral arguments that a fee award closer to $70 million would be appropriate. Interestingly enough, back in October, Justice Karen L. Valihura noted that the $176 award was $60 million more than the Delaware judiciary’s budget from the previous year. This was quite interesting as the case was “settled midstream.”
The lawsuit was brought by a pension fund on behalf of Tesla shareholders and focused exclusively on director pay during the 2017–2020 period. The case is separate from other high-profile compensation disputes involving Elon Musk.
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