Connect with us

News

A Norwegian Teslarati’s ownership experience

Norway sees the first delivery glitches.

Published

on

Tesla Model S Winter Driving

Tesla-Model-S-Winter-Driving-NorwayTesla Motors is entering the Norwegian market, which has given a strong boost to its global sales in the past few months. The country, not only boasts very serious green credentials, but also has taken to electric vehicles (EV). However, not everything is peachy in Norway with Tesla, according to our Teslarati tipster.

So far, Tesla sold over 2,200 Tesla S the first 3 months of entering the market in Norway. This makes Norway the second largest market for Tesla, and an important part of its bottom line. Tesla Motors is a new company and entering a new market is already difficult for an established carmaker, let alone for a startup. If we rave about the ways it conducts its business in the U.S., things are not as perfect in that new market. Methinks, there is something fishy in Norway!

Norwegian Teslaratipster

Our Teslaratipster found three other individuals who have the same problem, he has in a few forums in Norway. Many have to wait a very long time for the delivery of their Model S. How long? It can last 4 to 6 months. Does it remind you of anything, you early Roadster owners?

Discontent is already brewing with a few who were promised priority delivery and often get theirs later than non-priority customers. The rest, you can finger out. There is much frustration in Norway with Tesla, which is not a good thing to have for its second largest market.

To make things worse, the warranty service wildly fluctuates from customer to customer, blurring the experience even further. Some are helped right away, while others can sometime wait up to 2 months to fix problems. It gets even more complicated when you consider some buy their Model S directly, while others take out a loan, with no guarantee of having anything fixed in a timely manner. They still have to pay interest on the car that either does not work, or has faulty parts. In short, Tesla could be facing its first real, full-blown media catastrophe in Norway by not providing an equal service to all of its brand new customers and giving them the experience we rave about here in the U.S. It needs to act very fast to avert a disaster.

Warranty and quality

Tesla-Model-S-Winter-Driving-Norway-Superchargers

Image source: Bjorn Nyland

Norway, like many other countries, has the same problem EVs face anywhere else. Where do you charge your brand new beautiful Tesla Model S? For the majority of users, this is a huge problem and home charging on a 240 V plug can take a log time… a very long time. We know Tesla is working as quickly as it can to install Superchargers around the country. Unfortunately, the first batches of the Model S came with a few problems, such as water leaking from the panoramic roof, which makes it way in the lamps and fills cracks. This is not what you want to see in a brand new car, let alone, an electric one from a foreign startup.

Our Teslaratipster says he sent a letter to his local representative, who has to contact management in the Netherlands before any help can be received through the U.S.. This is nowhere near what we are accustomed to in the U.S.

We want to see Tesla Motors succeed, and so far, the company has done almost everything right. But is it stretching itself too thin by not having thoroughly thought out its customer service in its second largest and new market in a new country? One thing is for sure, Tesla cannot afford big mistakes. The news will be all over this and pressure will be applied in every direction. Tesla must nip this in the bud quickly.

Advertisement
-
Advertisement
Comments

News

Tesla’s Cybercab fleet jumped 8x in a month, with Dallas up next

Tesla confirms its first official Cybercab fleet number as Austin scales fast and Dallas looms.

Published

on

By

Tesla says more than 300 Cybercabs are now serving Austin, the first time the company has put an official number on its active Cybercab fleet. The figure came from the Robotaxi account on X on Saturday, which wrote that one month after launch the service had “scaled to 300+ Cybercabs serving Austin – an 8x increase in 30 days.”

Ashok Elluswamy, Tesla’s head of AI software, quoted the post with a line that carried the bigger news. “Two years since the 10/10 Cybercab WeRobot event, the cabs are everywhere in Austin now. Dallas soon,” he wrote. It is the first time Tesla has named the next city for public Cybercab rides.

Tesla opened Cybercab rides to the public in Austin on September 4, as Teslarati reported, a day after an invite only launch event. The ramp since then has been steep. Our September 28 report had the fleet at well over 100 units after availability jumped from 58 to 125 in a single week. On Thursday, Tesla added 150 Cybercabs to the Texas automated vehicle registry, lifting its registered count to 319 from 169. The first seven appeared on the registry on August 31.

RobotaxiTracker, a community site that counts vehicles from sightings and state records, listed 275 vehicles in unsupervised service in Austin on Saturday, 105 of them Cybercabs, which is well below Tesla’s figure. Tracker counts can lag official numbers, though Sawyer Merritt noted that Cybercab wait times in Austin stayed short on Saturday evening even with more than 2,000 fans in town for X Takeover.

Advertisement
-

Regulators are watching the rollout. NHTSA opened an audit query into Tesla’s certification that the Cybercab meets federal safety standards, and sworn answers are due October 30. Tesla reports third quarter earnings on October 21, which gives the company a natural venue to define its fleet numbers and put a date on Dallas.

Continue Reading

Elon Musk

Elon Musk roasts India’s billionaire Mukesh Ambani as Starlink fight heats up

Elon Musk sarcastically calls Mukesh Ambani ‘Prime Minister’ as the Starlink India standoff escalates again.

Published

on

By

Elon Musk escalated his public fight over Starlink’s launch in India on Friday, addressing Reliance chairman Mukesh Ambani as “Prime Minister Ambani” in a sarcastic post on X. “Please accept my humble apologies for not realizing that you are the real boss of India,” Musk wrote, before accusing Ambani of “monopolistic exploitation” and asking whether he would “consider allowing Starlink to compete.” In follow up posts, he said Starlink has proven essential during natural disasters and would help parts of India with no internet access.

The post came two days into a fight that Musk sparked up on Wednesday, when he said Starlink was “being blocked by certain oligarchs in order to maintain their monopolistic chokehold on the Indian people.” He called it “a crime against the people of India” and left the names out, adding only, “You can guess who they are.” Jio and Airtel together hold more than 80% of India’s telecom market. On Thursday, Musk asked whether Ambani is “the real boss of India” and said Starlink has spent five years complying with “every single law and requirement” of the Indian government.

India’s government has pushed back each time. The Ministry of Communications called the suggestion that its framework is unfair or discriminatory “baseless and misconceived.” Communications Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia said Friday that three companies hold satcom licenses: Starlink, Jio Satellite Communications, and Bharti backed Eutelsat OneWeb. Amazon’s Kuiper, now Amazon Leo, is still going through the process. None can launch until regulators finalize satellite spectrum pricing and the Home Ministry signs off on each company’s security compliance. Scindia said the telecom regulator and the Department of Telecommunications are close to a decision on pricing, The Hindu reported. Bharti chairman Sunil Mittal also said OneWeb is still waiting on approvals.

Starlink received its operator license in 2025 after a three year wait, and the space regulator IN-SPACe granted what industry executives called the last approval needed in July. The holdup since then centers on security, particularly concern that foreign operators could bypass Indian gateways.

Musk and Ambani have been on opposite sides of this before. In late 2024, Ambani argued for auctioning satellite spectrum, which Musk criticized as out of step with the rest of the world, and India chose administrative allocation instead. By March 2025, the two sides had signed a deal to sell Starlink devices in Reliance stores, and Starlink secured its telecom license that June. That partner is now also a competitor. Jio is reportedly weighing a constellation of 1,600 to 1,650 satellites costing an estimated $10 billion to $15 billion, while Akash Ambani has told shareholders Jio plans to lease capacity from global providers to move quickly.

Advertisement
-
Continue Reading

Elon Musk

Elon Musk’s surprise addition to the X Takeover lineup has fans talking

Elon Musk will join Saturday’s X Takeover at Giga Texas for a live virtual interview.

Published

on

By

Credit: Tesla Owners Silicon Valley
Credit: Tesla Owners Silicon Valley

Elon Musk will join X Takeover at Giga Texas on Saturday for a live virtual interview, according to Sawyer Merritt, who shared the news late Thursday. Musk will not be on stage in Austin. The conversation is set to stream for free on the @teslaownersSV account on X.

Organizers had kept expectations in check. In a September update, Tesla Owners Silicon Valley said Musk had appeared at the event twice before but was not promising a third appearance, even as fans hoped he would walk the Giga Texas grounds in person. A virtual spot matches 2024, when Musk gave a surprise interview of about an hour to the crowd in San Luis Obispo, as Teslarati reported at the time.

This year’s edition is a first in several ways. It is the first X Takeover held outside California and the first at a Tesla facility, with tickets selling out in eight days. Tesla provides the venue, but the event is produced independently by Tesla Owners Silicon Valley. The main event runs from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. CT, followed by a drone and light show at 9 p.m. Maye Musk is the keynote speaker, Franz von Holzhausen is set for a virtual keynote, and Nicki Minaj is the special guest. Joe Tegtmeyer, whose drone footage Teslarati used to track the Optimus factory steel frame at Giga Texas, is also on the speaker list.

Musk’s interview topics have not been revealed, but the backdrop is busy. Tesla doubled its Cybercab fleet in Austin in late September, and last week Musk explained why Robotaxi hours only moved from 10 p.m. to 11 p.m.. Merritt also reported Thursday that Texas DMV records now show 319 registered Cybercabs, up from 169. NHTSA’s deadline for Tesla’s sworn answers on Cybercab certification is October 30, and Tesla reports third quarter earnings on October 21.

Advertisement
-

Fans who cannot make it to Austin can watch the livestream on X. Musk tends to say more in unscripted settings than he does in prepared remarks, which is the reason this one is worth having open on Saturday.

Continue Reading