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German auto industry wary of EV innovations inspired by Tesla
More than 300 high-ranking representatives of the German automotive industry gathered in Berlin recently to hear the President of the German Association of the Automotive Industry (VDA) express firm views that “the calls to ban combustion engines are becoming louder.”
VDA President Matthias Wissmann explained that the German automotive industry has already invested 14 billion euros in electric mobility, and, with 30 electric models in series production, it is currently one of the world’s leading providers of electric mobility. Electric mobility is an important component for achieving climate targets, reducing emissions of pollutants, and lowering CO2. The VDA expects that the country’s automotive manufacturers will more than triple the number of electric vehicle models to nearly 100 by 2020 as battery costs decline and electric ranges increase toward 500 km. That will edge closer to the distances gasoline and diesel cars can travel on a single tank.
Wissman warned that, if energy policy follows developments, both passenger cars and commercial vehicles would need to adhere to increased regulations and automakers would have to engage in some serious self-examination. “This industry is not start-up company that can constantly procure fresh funding despite persistent losses,” he said in a remark likely directed at Tesla. “Today we can imagine that in 2025, 15 to 25 percent of new passenger car registrations worldwide could be electric vehicles. The trend is accelerating – just a short while ago experts thought a share of only 3 percent was more likely. Every fourth or fifth new car sold will then have an electric drive.” Tesla, it must be noted, paid back its Department of Energy loan nine years early.
The German car industry is investing 40 billion euros in alternative drivetrains. This amount includes research and development expenditures as well as assets such as equipment and tools for production. Late last month BMW, Daimler, and the Volkswagen Group were among European automakers that signed a declaration of intent to start next year with the construction of a quick charging network for electric cars based on the CCS standard. Of course, Tesla has also joined the CharIN group, which created and promotes the CCS charging standard commonly found on the SAE-Combo plug.
The German automotive industry has recently intensified research and development activities in the fields of digitization and connected driving. Instead of having “to worry about the new competition,” Wissman said the German automotive industry aims to be right at the forefront of developments. These were more lightly-veiled references to Tesla Motors, Inc., with its Model S now performing as the best selling luxury car in Western Europe, accelerating past traditional high-status and internal combustion engine powered favorites like the Mercedes S class, BMW 7 Series, Audi A8, and Porsche Panamera. Wissman also affirmed that European automakers could not switch immediately to electric vehicles and eliminate combustion engines from their catalogs, as they employ hundreds of thousands of workers around the world – many of which build diesel and gasoline engines.
To accelerate the evolution toward innovative automotive methods, Wissman described how the German automotive industry is now working intensively on new mobility concepts that generate totally new business models. “This trend arises from a rapidly changing expectation on the part of customers, who no longer demand just a product, but instead a mobility service,” Wissmann said. “In addition, completely new players are appearing on the market, such as large IT corporations. We take this challenge seriously, and are also tackling it.”
The VDA recognizes that increased efficiency, recycling, and a reduction in emissions benefit both companies and consumers as is preserving natural resources is an integral part of national and European regulation. They note on their website that, according to figures published in the national Inventory Report of the German Environmental Agency, CO₂ emissions produced by road traffic in Germany from 1999 to 2012 dropped by about 30 million metric tons. “In the last ten years the average fuel consumption by newly registered passenger cars in the EU has been brought down by over one quarter, and CO2 emissions have fallen in parallel,” Wissman noted. “The potential has not yet been exhausted. We expect that in the next few years we can increase the efficiency of gasoline and diesel vehicles by at least another 10 to 15 percent.”
Since 2006, German road traffic CO₂ emissions have been below 1990 levels for the seventh successive year and are around 5 million metric tons less than the 1990 figure. No other Western European country has so far succeeded on a sustained basis in reducing road traffic CO₂ emissions below the level of 1990, according to the VDA. German automakers’ shifts to more fuel-efficient and carbon-reducing vehicles, however, can only help reduce these levels further.
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Tesla ends Full Self-Driving purchase option in the U.S.
In January, Musk announced that Tesla would remove the ability to purchase the suite outright for $8,000. This would give the vehicle Full Self-Driving for its entire lifespan, but Tesla intended to move away from it, for several reasons, one being that a tranche in the CEO’s pay package requires 10 million active subscriptions of FSD.
Tesla has officially ended the option to purchase the Full Self-Driving suite outright, a move that was announced for the United States market in January by CEO Elon Musk.
The driver assistance suite is now exclusively available in the U.S. as a subscription, which is currently priced at $99 per month.
Tesla moved away from the outright purchase option in an effort to move more people to the subscription program, but there are concerns over its current price and the potential for it to rise.
In January, Musk announced that Tesla would remove the ability to purchase the suite outright for $8,000. This would give the vehicle Full Self-Driving for its entire lifespan, but Tesla intended to move away from it, for several reasons, one being that a tranche in the CEO’s pay package requires 10 million active subscriptions of FSD.
Although Tesla moved back the deadline in other countries, it has now taken effect in the U.S. on Sunday morning. Tesla updated its website to reflect this:
🚨 Tesla has officially moved the outright purchase option for FSD on its website pic.twitter.com/RZt1oIevB3
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) February 15, 2026
There are still some concerns regarding its price, as $99 per month is not where many consumers are hoping to see the subscription price stay.
Musk has said that as capabilities improve, the price will go up, but it seems unlikely that 10 million drivers will want to pay an extra $100 every month for the capability, even if it is extremely useful.
Instead, many owners and fans of the company are calling for Tesla to offer a different type of pricing platform. This includes a tiered-system that would let owners pick and choose the features they would want for varying prices, or even a daily, weekly, monthly, and annual pricing option, which would incentivize longer-term purchasing.
Although Musk and other Tesla are aware of FSD’s capabilities and state is is worth much more than its current price, there could be some merit in the idea of offering a price for Supervised FSD and another price for Unsupervised FSD when it becomes available.
Elon Musk
Musk bankers looking to trim xAI debt after SpaceX merger: report
xAI has built up $18 billion in debt over the past few years, with some of this being attributed to the purchase of social media platform Twitter (now X) and the creation of the AI development company. A new financing deal would help trim some of the financial burden that is currently present ahead of the plan to take SpaceX public sometime this year.
Elon Musk’s bankers are looking to trim the debt that xAI has taken on over the past few years, following the company’s merger with SpaceX, a new report from Bloomberg says.
xAI has built up $18 billion in debt over the past few years, with some of this being attributed to the purchase of social media platform Twitter (now X) and the creation of the AI development company. Bankers are trying to create some kind of financing plan that would trim “some of the heavy interest costs” that come with the debt.
The financing deal would help trim some of the financial burden that is currently present ahead of the plan to take SpaceX public sometime this year. Musk has essentially confirmed that SpaceX would be heading toward an IPO last month.
The report indicates that Morgan Stanley is expected to take the leading role in any financing plan, citing people familiar with the matter. Morgan Stanley, along with Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, and JPMorgan Chase & Co., are all expected to be in the lineup of banks leading SpaceX’s potential IPO.
Since Musk acquired X, he has also had what Bloomberg says is a “mixed track record with debt markets.” Since purchasing X a few years ago with a $12.5 billion financing package, X pays “tens of millions in interest payments every month.”
That debt is held by Bank of America, Barclays, Mitsubishi, UFJ Financial, BNP Paribas SA, Mizuho, and Société Générale SA.
X merged with xAI last March, which brought the valuation to $45 billion, including the debt.
SpaceX announced the merger with xAI earlier this month, a major move in Musk’s plan to alleviate Earth of necessary data centers and replace them with orbital options that will be lower cost:
“In the long term, space-based AI is obviously the only way to scale. To harness even a millionth of our Sun’s energy would require over a million times more energy than our civilization currently uses! The only logical solution, therefore, is to transport these resource-intensive efforts to a location with vast power and space. I mean, space is called “space” for a reason.”
The merger has many advantages, but one of the most crucial is that it positions the now-merged companies to fund broader goals, fueled by revenue from the Starlink expansion, potential IPO, and AI-driven applications that could accelerate the development of lunar bases.
News
Tesla pushes Full Self-Driving outright purchasing option back in one market
Tesla announced last month that it would eliminate the ability to purchase the Full Self-Driving software outright, instead opting for a subscription-only program, which will require users to pay monthly.
Tesla has pushed the opportunity to purchase the Full Self-Driving suite outright in one market: Australia.
The date remains February 14 in North America, but Tesla has pushed the date back to March 31, 2026, in Australia.
NEWS: Tesla is ending the option to buy FSD as a one-time outright purchase in Australia on March 31, 2026.
It still ends on Feb 14th in North America. https://t.co/qZBOztExVT pic.twitter.com/wmKRZPTf3r
— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) February 13, 2026
Tesla announced last month that it would eliminate the ability to purchase the Full Self-Driving software outright, instead opting for a subscription-only program, which will require users to pay monthly.
If you have already purchased the suite outright, you will not be required to subscribe once again, but once the outright purchase option is gone, drivers will be required to pay the monthly fee.
The reason for the adjustment is likely due to the short period of time the Full Self-Driving suite has been available in the country. In North America, it has been available for years.
Tesla hits major milestone with Full Self-Driving subscriptions
However, Tesla just launched it just last year in Australia.
Full Self-Driving is currently available in seven countries: the United States, Canada, China, Mexico, Australia, New Zealand, and South Korea.
The company has worked extensively for the past few years to launch the suite in Europe. It has not made it quite yet, but Tesla hopes to get it launched by the end of this year.
In North America, Tesla is only giving customers one more day to buy the suite outright before they will be committed to the subscription-based option for good.
The price is expected to go up as the capabilities improve, but there are no indications as to when Tesla will be doing that, nor what type of offering it plans to roll out for owners.
Tesla ends Full Self-Driving purchase option in the U.S.
Musk bankers looking to trim xAI debt after SpaceX merger: report
