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Tesla’s battery supply constraint is ending, price parity with gas cars is at hand

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Tesla’s Semi is coming, and it will be here sooner than expected. But the production of the vehicle could be pointing to one thing: Tesla is no longer battery constrained.

Past the face value portion of the story, something much bigger is happening. While the Semi entering a “volume production” phase is big news, the development of the commercial vehicle comes at a time where battery production for Tesla seems to be the main focus of the electric automaker.

In Q3 2019, CEO Elon Musk indicated that a shortage of battery cells primarily drove the Semi’s delay. If Tesla wanted to start producing the Semi, the company would have to make cells available for it. That would mean one thing: cutting back on cells utilized for Tesla’s mass-market vehicles, which at the time was the Model 3.

Building the Semi before a sufficient battery production and supply chain was established would have been detrimental to the company’s long-term plans. Of course, the Model 3 has been Tesla’s most popular vehicle since it started deliveries in 2017. Its affordability has helped Tesla reach a new market, which was all apart of Elon’s original Master Plan.

Inside Tesla Gigafactory Shanghai’s battery pack facility. (Credit: Tesla)

With the Model Y now being produced in Fremont, Tesla now has two mass-market vehicles that are affordable by a vast segment of the population. Ultimately, this means that Tesla needed to levy a majority of its available lithium-ion cells for the Model 3 and Model Y. Unfortunately, the Semi just was not a priority over those two cars. Why would it be? The Model 3 (and Model Y now) are Tesla’s two top sellers. Therefore, the battery needs pointed toward the 3 and the Y, with Semi production being dependent on the availability of battery cells.

If we think about Musk’s statement from Q3, he indicated that the Semi production would be based on when Tesla could manufacture the appropriate amount of lithium-ion batteries to power the Class 8 vehicle. Although demand for the 3 and the Y continues to increase, so is Tesla’s production rate, and it could be indicative that the Silicon Valley-based electric car maker is pumping out enough batteries to produce all of its vehicles without any worries of possible cell shortages.

Ultimately, this idea could lead to another significant development in the EV world as a whole, and that is price parity.

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For a long time, analysts have pinpointed the electric vehicle movement’s price parity at $100/kWh for battery cell production. This means that when cells are produced at a high enough rate, batteries will be lower in cost. Then, electric cars will be the same price as gas-powered machines, making the argument of “EVs are too expensive” obsolete.

The Tesla Model 3 Performance utilizes a 75 kWh battery pack. If battery production is at $120/kWh, this would mean that the Model 3 Performance’s battery pack costs $9,000 to produce. The car’s $54,990 price tag, hypothetically at $120 per kWh, is made up of a battery pack that costs about $9,000.

If Tesla could produce batteries at a high enough rate where the cost per kWh could come down to $100, the battery pack would only cost $7,500 to build, meaning an additional $1,500 comes off the price of the vehicle altogether. Tesla’s goal is to produce enough battery cells to justify this pricing point for its cars. Also, $100/kWh is just the price parity point, and not where the cost will ultimately end up. If demand continues to increase and battery cell production keeps growing, the cost could get even lower.

If Tesla has enough batteries to justify producing mass quantities of the Model 3 and Model Y, along with the sizable battery packs of the Semi, parity could be coming sooner than expected. Most analysts indicated 2023 as the year when battery production would be on a level where EV prices could compete with their petrol-powered counterparts.

However, if the Semi is ready for a production run now, Tesla may have enough cells to introduce a more affordable pricing model for its vehicles. This could, in turn, lead to even higher production numbers, increased demand, and a sharp increase in the company’s delivery numbers.

The announcement of the Tesla Semi meant much more than the company producing its commercial vehicle. It means batteries are no longer in restricted amounts, the technology is improving, and the prices of the company’s vehicles could be coming down soon. With this, it appears that Elon Musk’s endgame with his Master Plan may be getting closer to reality.

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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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Tesla’s mirrorless Cybercab will give riders a visibility upgrade

Tesla engineer confirms Cybercab update letting riders pull up rear and repeater cameras on demand.

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Tesla Cybercab camera visibility for passengers (Credit: Dan Burkland via X)
Tesla Cybercab camera visibility for passengers (Credit: Dan Burkland via X)

Tesla is working on a Cybercab update that would let passengers pull up the vehicle’s rear and side cameras on demand, and the request came straight from a rider.

The exchange played out on X late Friday. Cybercab rider Dan Burkland shared photos of the two-seater’s cabin screen after an evening ride, praised the UI team’s work, and left one request: let riders open the rear and repeater cameras whenever they want, “especially for peace of mind.” Tesla UI software engineer Evan (@CarCoder) answered with two words: “In development.”

The idea fits a pattern Teslarati has tracked since public rides began. Days after paid Cybercab service opened in Austin, Tesla sent riders a survey that asked them to rate the touchscreen, the app and the cabin, and to pick the features they wanted most. We reported on that survey in September, and a camera view is the kind of small software change Tesla can push quickly if riders keep asking.

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It also speaks to something unique about the vehicle. With no steering wheel, no pedals and no driver, passengers have no mirror to check and no way to see behind them. The hardware is clearly built for camera awareness, from the repeater cameras to the rear camera. Letting a passenger look through those same cameras would give a nervous first time rider a way to confirm what is around the car.

The timing matters because the fleet is growing fast. Tesla’s Robotaxi account said on Saturday that more than 300 Cybercabs are now serving Austin, an eightfold increase in 30 days, and Tesla AI chief Ashok Elluswamy named Dallas as the next city. More cars and more cities mean more people riding in a driverless vehicle for the first time, which is exactly when small trust features carry weight.

For now, the feature is confirmed only as in development. If Tesla follows its usual pattern with Cybercab software, riders could see it appear in a point release without any announcement, and Teslarati will watch for it.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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