News
Porsche Mission E pre-production pics reveal new details about Tesla rival
Details of the pre-production variant of Porsche’s rival to the Tesla Model S, the Mission E, was recently revealed in the German carmaker’s Annual & Sustainability report for 2017. The images of the Mission E pre-production units reveal similarities and changes to the vehicle’s eye-catching concept that Porsche revealed during the 2015 Frankfurt Motor Show.
Details of the pre-production Mission E in Porsche’s recent report include the electric car’s passenger doors, which appear to have taken a step away from the concept version’s suicide doors. The pre-production design’s front, however, carries over much of the details found on the concept, including the eye-catching aerodynamic lines that bend into the car’s headlights.
The pre-production Mission E’s storage spaces were also visible in the images provided by the German legacy carmaker. Based on the photos, the frunk of the pre-production Mission E appears to be in the same ballpark as the Model 3. Thanks to its broad-hipped design, the Mission E’s rear trunk seems to have a lot of space as well.
Also included in the report is an image of the vehicle’s charge port, which is designed to be compatible with the IONITY charging network. As we noted in a previous report, the IONITY network, which is built in collaboration by the Volkswagen Group, BMW Group, Daimler AG, and the Ford Motor Company, is designed to rival Tesla’s Supercharger network. IONITY exceeds the current output of Tesla’s 120 kW Superchargers, with an output of 350 kW. With this charging infrastructure in place, Porsche claims that the Mission E could gain 248 miles of range in as little as 15 minutes.
- Details of the pre-production units of the Mission E were featured in Porsche’s 2017 Annual & Sustainability report. [Credit: Porsche]
- Details of the pre-production units of the Mission E were featured in Porsche’s 2017 Annual & Sustainability report. [Credit: Porsche]
- Details of the pre-production units of the Mission E were featured in Porsche’s 2017 Annual & Sustainability report. [Credit: Porsche]
- Details of the pre-production units of the Mission E were featured in Porsche’s 2017 Annual & Sustainability report. [Credit: Porsche]
- Details of the pre-production units of the Mission E were featured in Porsche’s 2017 Annual & Sustainability report. [Credit: Porsche]
According to a recent report from GearBrain, however, Porsche’s pay system for the IONITY network would be on the other side of the spectrum as Tesla’s Superchargers. Tesla’s high-powered Superchargers charge Model 3 owners every time they use the infrastructure, but owners of the Model S and Model X — the Elon Musk-led company’s flagships — can use the chargers for free.
In a statement to the publication, Porsche’s deputy chairman of the executive board Lutz Meschke noted that the company would bill Mission E owners for charging services from day one of ownership. The executive also noted that the rates for the IONITY network would be comparable to the prices of gasoline. The Porsche executive also downplayed the business model of Tesla’s charging infrastructure, stating that the Supercharger network “was only free for a while.”
“Yes, but it (Tesla’s Supercharger network) was only free for a while. You can not run things like this; you have to earn money from these services. We want to earn money with the new products and services,” Meschke said.
The Porsche executive’s statement about the Supercharger network’s rates is only partly true, of course, as only Model 3 owners are adopting a pay-per-use model. In a recent statement on its website announcing a price adjustment for the service, Tesla even asserted that the company is not looking to make money from the Supercharger network.
“Tesla is committed to ensuring that Supercharger will never be a profit center,” Tesla wrote.
Elon Musk
The Boring Company’s latest Tesla tunnel truck mod “fits like a glove”
The Boring Company has modified a Tesla powered tunnel truck to carry freight containers underground.
The Boring Company has found a second job for the Tesla hardware it already runs underground. In a post on X, Elon Musk’s tunneling company showed its latest Prufrock Liner Truck modified to carry a standard 20 foot shipping container. “Using TBC tunnels to transport freight,” the company wrote. “The latest Prufrock Liner Truck (using Tesla Model 3 batteries and drive units) has been modified to carry a standard 20′ shipping container. Fits like a glove!”
The photo shows a red container sitting on a long, low white chassis parked outside, with drive hardware visible at one end. The Boring Company did not say where or when freight hauling would start, which customers it has in mind, or how many trucks it is converting.
Using TBC tunnels to transport freight.
The latest Prufrock Liner Truck (using Tesla Model 3 batteries and drive units) has been modified to carry a standard 20’ shipping container.
Fits like a glove! https://t.co/VV0phWK4fc
— The Boring Company (@boringcompany) October 19, 2026
Until now, the liner trucks have hauled concrete. Teslarati reported in August on Liner Truck 3, which uses Model 3 battery packs and drive units to move more than 22,000 pounds of precast tunnel segments to the boring machine. It has 28 miles of range, tops out at 12 mph, and is piloted remotely from the company’s operations center in Texas. The freight version appears to be the same platform with a different bed, and The Boring Company has not said whether it will also be remotely piloted.
Freight has been on the company’s menu for years. When TBC updated its product lineup in 2021, its freight tunnel was described as sized to fit a standard shipping container, “barely.” The company later used the idea at Tesla’s own factory, where Prufrock 3 dug a tunnel to Giga Texas that now moves finished Cybertrucks away from the production line.
The Boring Company closed a $3 billion Series D in September at a $23 billion valuation, and Teslarati has covered how that money is tied to a UAE tunneling push and a faster Nashville build. In Nashville, Prufrock MB1 and MB2 are mining at the same time, and a third machine is expected to launch in late October. Each machine needs a steady supply of liner trucks, so any design that works for segments and containers alike gives the company more use out of the same Tesla parts.
The Vegas Loop remains the only Boring Company system open to the public, and it moves passengers in Tesla vehicles. A freight service would be a separate product, and the post gave no indication that one is close to launch. For now, it is a truck, a container and a short caption saying they fit together.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk will give ‘every kid in America’ a SpaceX share in 2027
Elon Musk said he is planning to give “every one of his SpaceX shares to every kid in America” in 2027, stating that “this will be the first of many.”
SpaceX went public earlier this year, and its stock price has been relatively stable since leveling off shortly after its IPO. Based on its current price, it’s a gift of just over $10 billion to children across the United States.
It appears to be closely related to President Donald Trump’s bank accounts for children, which were set up earlier this year as Trump Accounts.
Just hours earlier, Anthropic had announced the establishment of its Anthropic Public Benefit Fund, “a new wholly-owned entity dedicated entirely to public benefit.” Musk responded by stating he recommended “giving the shares directly to the public,” and that he would be doing it that way.
Just a little bit later, Musk said children across the U.S. would be getting a share from him:
Next year, I will give one of my SpaceX shares to every kid in America.
This will be the first of many.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 19, 2026
There are roughly 70 million children, meaning someone under the age of 18, in the United States, according to the Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics. Musk’s ownership of SpaceX stock shows he has around 849 million Class A shares of SpaceX stock, according to filings with the SEC.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk reveals why Boring Co’s biggest East Coast project never happened
Elon Musk revealed in a post on X that “Permits were impossible to get,” explaining the fate of The Boring Company’s most ambitious East Coast proposal.
The comment responded to a query about what became of his July 20, 2017 announcement that he had “just received verbal govt approval” for an underground Hyperloop connecting New York City, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C., capable of carrying passengers from the Big Apple to the Nation’s Capital in just 29 minutes.
The Boring Company receives verbal ‘approval’ to build NY to DC Hyperloop tunnel
The 2017 post, which envisioned city-center stations and multiple elevators in each city, sparked immediate scrutiny. Local and state officials in New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and D.C. said they had no knowledge of any approval. A White House spokesperson confirmed only “promising conversations” about the transformative infrastructure.
Musk clarified shortly after that there was “still a lot of work” to do for formal approvals.
@cybrtrkguy Permits were impossible to get
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 19, 2026
Limited progress followed, as Maryland Governor Larry Hogan’s administration issued a conditional utility permit and supported work near Fort Meade. In 2018, Washington, D.C., granted a preliminary permit for site preparation and excavation on a vacant lot at 53 New York Ave. NE in the NoMa neighborhood, which The Boring Company said could become a station.
A draft environmental assessment for a D.C.-Baltimore segment was released in 2019. Yet, by April 2021, the company had removed the project from its website, and the Federal Highway Administration reported receiving no indication of further interest. Communication with Maryland officials had ceased.
The full corridor would have required coordination among the District of Columbia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New York, the Federal Highway Administration, the Army Corps of Engineers, the National Park Service, and other agencies.
Environmental reviews under the National Environmental Policy Act, utility clearances, and approvals for novel infrastructure added to the overall complexity of the project and its approval.
Speculation on the permitting barriers centers around a few factors, but a multi-state, multi-level route involving unproven high-speed vacuum-tube technology inherently triggers exhaustive safety, environmental, and engineering reviews that can stretch for years, even for conventional projects.
There are also other elements, of course, like officials who may face political exposure if a privately funded, untested system encountered anything such as cost overruns, delays, or safety issues. On the outset of this project, there were limited things such as engineering plans or demonstrated technology maturity, which also added to the potential skepticism.
The East Coast vision for Boring Co., once framed as a privately funded revolution that could reshape Northeast travel, quietly ended without construction of the promised network. Musk’s recent statement frames the outcome as a regulatory impasse, unfortunate but not unexpected.







