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Elon Musk explains Tesla’s domestic battery strategy

Elon Musk responded to a new note from an analyst that highlighted Tesla’s battery strategy.

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Elon Musk giving YouTube tech reviewer Marques Brownlee a tour of the Fremont factory. (Credit: MKBHD/YouTube)

Tesla CEO Elon Musk explained the automaker’s strategy for building batteries from top to bottom in a domestic setting as the company continues to alleviate its reliance on Chinese materials, something other companies are too dependent on.

With the Trump Administration, it is no secret that the prioritization of U.S.-built products, including sourcing most of the materials from American companies, is at the forefront of its strategy.

The goal is to become less dependent on foreign products, which would, in theory, bolster the U.S. economy by creating more jobs and having less reliance on foreign markets, especially China, to manufacture the key parts of things like cars and tech.

In a note from Alexander Potter, an analyst for the firm Piper Sandler, Tesla’s strategy regarding batteries specifically is broken down.

Potter says Tesla is “the only car company that is trying to source batteries, at scale, without relying on China.”

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He continues:

“Eventually, Tesla will be making its own cathode active materials, refining its own lithium, building its own anodes, coating its own electrodes, assembling its own cells, and selling its own cars; No other US company can make similar claims.”

Musk, who spent time within the Trump White House through his work with the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), said that Tesla is doing the “important” work of localizing supply chains as the risks that come with being too dependent on foreign entities could be detrimental to a company, especially one that utilizes many parts and supplies that are manufactured mostly in China.

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Tesla has done a lot of work to source and even manufacture its own batteries within the United States, a project that has been in progress for several years but will pay dividends in the end.

According to a 2023 Nikkei analysis, Tesla’s battery material suppliers were dominated by Chinese companies. At the time, a whopping 39 percent of the company’s cell materials came from Chinese companies.

This number is decreasing as it operates its own in-house cell and material production projects, like its lithium refinery in Texas.

It also wants to utilize battery manufacturers that have plans to build cells in the U.S.

Panasonic, for example, is building a facility in Kansas that will help Tesla utilize domestically-manufactured cells for its cars.

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Joey has been a journalist covering electric mobility at TESLARATI since August 2019. In his spare time, Joey is playing golf, watching MMA, or cheering on any of his favorite sports teams, including the Baltimore Ravens and Orioles, Miami Heat, Washington Capitals, and Penn State Nittany Lions. You can get in touch with joey at joey@teslarati.com. He is also on X @KlenderJoey. If you're looking for great Tesla accessories, check out shop.teslarati.com

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Elon Musk

Elon Musk argues lidar and radar make self driving cars more dangerous

The CEO is not just stating that using sensors like lidar is unnecessary to achieve self-driving.

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Credit: Tesla/YouTube

Elon Musk is taking a firmer stance in the vision vs lidar debate for autonomous driving. In his more recent comments, the CEO is not just stating that using sensors like lidar is unnecessary to achieve self-driving. 

Musk is stating that using lidar actually makes self-driving cars more dangerous. 

Uber CEO’s comments

During a recent interview, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi shared his thoughts on the autonomy race. As per the CEO, he is still inclined to believe that Waymo’s approach, which requires outfitting cars with equipment such as lidar and radar, is necessary to achieve superhuman levels of safety for self-driving cars. 

“Solid state LiDAR is $500. Why not include lidar as well in order to achieve super human safety. All of our partners are using a combination of camera, radar and LiDAR, and I personally think that’s the right solution, but I could be proven wrong,” the Uber CEO noted.

Elon Musk’s rebuttal

In response to the Uber CEO’s comments, Elon Musk stated that lidar and radar, at least based on Tesla’s experience, actually reduce safety instead of improving it. As per the Tesla CEO, there are times when sensors such as lidar and radar disagree with cameras. This creates sensor ambiguity, which, in turn, creates more risk. Musk then noted that Tesla has seen an improvement in safety once the company focused on a vision only approach. 

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“Lidar and radar reduce safety due to sensor contention. If lidars/radars disagree with cameras, which one wins? This sensor ambiguity causes increased, not decreased, risk. That’s why Waymos can’t drive on highways. We turned off the radars in Teslas to increase safety. Cameras ftw,’ Musk wrote.

Musk’s comments are quite notable as Tesla was able to launch a dedicated Robotaxi pilot in Austin and the Bay Area using its vision-based autonomous systems. The same is true for FSD, which is quickly becoming notably better than humans in driving. 

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Elon Musk

SpaceX Starship Flight 10: What to expect

SpaceX implemented hardware and operational changes aimed at improving Starship’s reliability.

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Credit: SpaceX

SpaceX is preparing to launch the tenth test flight of its Starship vehicle as early as Sunday, August 24, with the launch window opening at 6:30 p.m. CT. 

The mission follows investigations into anomalies from earlier flights, including the loss of Starship on its ninth test and a Ship 36 static fire issue. SpaceX has since implemented hardware and operational changes aimed at improving Starship’s reliability.

Booster landing burns and flight experiments

The upcoming Starship Flight 10 will expand Super Heavy’s flight envelope with multiple landing burn trials. Following stage separation, the booster will attempt a controlled flip and boostback burn before heading to an offshore splashdown in the Gulf of America. One of the three center engines typically used for landing will be intentionally disabled, allowing engineers to evaluate whether a backup engine can complete the maneuver, according to a post from SpaceX.

The booster will also transition to a two-engine configuration for the final phase, hovering briefly above the water before shutdown and drop. These experiments are designed to simulate off-nominal scenarios and generate real-world data on performance under varying conditions, while maximizing propellant use during ascent to enable heavier payloads.

Starship upper stage reentry tests

The Starship upper stage will attempt multiple in-space objectives, including deployment of eight Starlink simulators and a planned Raptor engine relight. SpaceX will also continue testing reentry systems with several modifications. A section of thermal protection tiles has been removed to expose vulnerable areas, while new metallic tile designs, including one with active cooling, will be trialed.

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Catch fittings have been installed to evaluate their thermal and structural performance, and adjustments to the tile line will address hot spots observed on Flight 6. The reentry profile is expected to push the structural limits of Starship’s rear flaps at maximum entry pressure.

SpaceX says lessons from these tests are critical to refining the next-generation Starship and Super Heavy vehicles. With Starfactory production ramping in Texas and new launch infrastructure under development in Florida, the company is pushing to hit its goal of achieving a fully reusable orbital launch system.

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Elon Musk takes aim at Bill Gates’ Microsoft with new AI venture “Macrohard”

It is quite an appropriate name for a company that’s designed to rival Microsoft.

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Credit: xAI/X

Elon Musk has set his sights on Microsoft with a new company called “Macrohard,” a software venture tied to his AI startup, xAI. 

Musk described the project as a “purely AI software company” that’s designed to generate hundreds of specialized coding and generative AI agents that could one day simulate products from companies like Microsoft entirely through artificial intelligence.

Macrohard‘s Purpose

Musk announced Macrohard on Friday, though xAI had already registered the trademark with the US Patent Office a few weeks ago, as noted in a PC Mag report. Interestingly enough, this is not the first time that Musk has mentioned such an initiative.

Just last month, he stated that xAI was “creating a multi-agent AI software company, where Grok spawns hundreds of specialized coding and image/video generation/understanding agents all working together and then emulates humans interacting with the software in virtual machines until the result is excellent.”

At the time, Musk stated that “This is a macro challenge and a hard problem with stiff competition,” hinting at the venture’s “Macrohard” moniker. A few years ago, Musk also posted “Macrohard >> Microsoft” on X. 

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Powered by xAI and Colossus

Macrohard appears to be closely linked to xAI’s Colossus 2 supercomputer project in Memphis. Musk has confirmed plans to acquire millions of Nvidia GPUs, joining rivals such as OpenAI and Meta in a high-stakes race for AI computing power. Colossus is already one of the most powerful supercomputer clusters in the world, and it is still being expanded.

xAI is only a couple of years old, having been founded in March 2023. During its Engineering Open House event in San Francisco, Elon Musk highlighted that the company’s speed will be its primary competitive edge. “No SR-71 Blackbird was ever shot down and it only had one strategy: to accelerate,” Musk said.

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