Tesla CEO Elon Musk may be bullish on electric cars, but he seems to be a bit wary of the automotive sector as a whole. In recent comments on Twitter, Musk noted that other automakers are actually “much closer” to bankruptcy than the companies realize.
Musk’s statement was a response to a post from former Tesla employee and YouTube creator Farzad Mesbahi, who observed that those who are focusing so much on Tesla are ignoring the fact that most other carmakers are closing in on bankruptcy. Musk’s response suggests that he agrees this is indeed the case. “Much closer than they realize,” Musk wrote.
The Tesla CEO has been pretty open about his cautious stance surrounding other carmakers. While Musk supported non-Tesla electric cars like the Porsche Taycan and the Ford Mustang Mach-E before, he has shared his reservations about the state of other automakers in the past. These include newcomers in the EV sector, such as Lucid Motors.
Just earlier this month, Elon Musk shared a warning to Lucid Motors after news emerged that the luxury electric car maker was adopting aggressive strategies to save its orders. Musk noted then that Lucid was “not long for this world,” a statement that echoes his previous warnings about the automotive sector in general.
When speaking about the difficulties of the automotive sector, Musk typically highlights the fact that the industry is extremely difficult — so much so that so far, only Tesla and Ford have avoided bankruptcy. Musk has shared some advice even to Tesla rivals in the past, telling electric truck maker Rivian that his recommendation would be for the company to optimize its first factory first before building another large facility.
“I’d recommend they get their first plant working. It’s insanely difficult to reach volume production at affordable unit cost,” Musk wrote on Twitter following news that Rivian was looking to build a new $5 billion plant in Texas.
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