News
‘Tesla Killers’ are like Bigfoot: They don’t exist and they never will
The term “Tesla Killer” should be retired for the rest of time. For years, automakers across the world have released their introductory electric cars into the quickly growing EV sector. With plans written out and cool, sporty photographs and renders of the “next big thing” in the EV sector being released by some of the world’s largest and oldest car company’s, many media outlets, including this one, have referred to some cars as “Tesla Killers” because that is what automakers are trying to do: knock Tesla off of its pedestal and try to derail some of the momentum that Elon Musk’s company has gained through the past several years.
The problem is this: These cars that are always coined as “Tesla Killers” never pan out to what they’re supposed to be. They’re all hype and relatively no real threat to Tesla or any of its vehicles. In all honesty, “Tesla Killers” are like Bigfoot. You always hear about them, but you never see them, and in the back of your mind, you think that it could be real, but more than likely, it isn’t.
I will admit, there are cars out there that have legitimate potential to derail some of Tesla’s momentum. I think the Lucid Air could be a great competitor to the Model S, and I think Rivian’s R1T could be a great option for potential Cybertruck owners. Some great cars are coming to the market, but none of them are worthy of being deemed a “Tesla Killer.”
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The fact is, the word “killer,” when attributed to everything, means it is a complete ending to any chance of success when used in the comparison of two things. A “Tesla Killer” would have to make a competing car model obsolete, killing it off from the market, and this simply doesn’t happen in the automotive world, at least in my opinion. Even if cars have slumpy sales records or slow months, someone will still buy that car eventually, no matter how crappy, inadequate, or ineffective that vehicle is.
The truth is that all of the cars labeled as “Tesla Killers” have always fallen short. I can remember the Mercedes-Benz EQC donning the label, only to sell barely any units and have the German automaker reconsidering its stance on EVs. The same thing was said about the EQS unveiling. While it is a beautiful car, does anyone really think it’s going to make Tesla reconsider its plans for future models or make it redesign any of its current ones?
Once-deemed ‘Tesla killer’ Mercedes EQC flops with 55 units sold in Germany to date
No, it won’t. It’s not an “it likely won’t” or “there’s a small chance.” It won’t happen. Period.
Tesla is on the top of the EV sector. Like it or not, nobody can really compete with them currently, and vaporware is the only real threat to Tesla’s current momentum. For years, these car companies have said they will build these incredible EVs with all of these great features. Towing capabilities, wading depth, 0-60 MPH times that are more than impressive, astronomical range ratings. You name it, one of these car companies has said it. But how many times, honestly, has a car company kept its word with an EV that it plans to release? How many times have these car companies with decades or even a century of experience come up short? How many times have EV enthusiasts been promised “the next big thing in the EV sector,” only to come up short and revise their plans?
The truth is, it happens more often than not. Car companies need to start getting honest about their issues when developing EVs. I believe transparency, not hopeless promises, is the key to winning over the incredibly loyal EV enthusiasts that make up the community. It is no secret that Tesla owners and fans are quite dismissive toward competitors. Can you really blame them? Can you see how for years, these other car companies have made all of these promises, only for their entire plan to crumble apart like an extra dry cookie?
This isn’t to say that Tesla is perfect, and it isn’t to say that they won’t eventually fall off of their pedestal. Tesla has plenty of issues. They’re dealing with supply constraints, timing inaccuracies, production bottlenecks, and delays in permissions (especially in Berlin). The company also has major issues with customer service and communication, something that has been a complaint in more recent memory. However, Tesla rarely misses when it comes to its cars. Yes, some come later than the company says, but there’s no denying that many of the specs it releases for its vehicles are accurate. No matter how astronomical or outlandish some specs may seem, Tesla usually makes good on its promises.
This is something that other automakers that have been deemed “Tesla Killers” simply haven’t done. They may put fancy names, specs, and features on their cars, but they either fall short and aren’t as effective as they say the car will be, or the car just gets delayed for several years until the companies have put in the correct infrastructure for adequate production.
“Tesla Killers” do not exist. They never have, and they never will. There will never be a car that comes along and makes a Tesla completely obsolete in the EV market. Besides, all of these companies producing “Tesla Killers” wouldn’t even plan to manufacture EVs if it wasn’t for Tesla. Let’s face it; these cars are really “Saviors” to whatever manufacturer they belong to because if they weren’t being planned or produced, these companies would be obsolete in a few years, especially as the EV sector continues to gain momentum and take market share away from petrol-powered machines.
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-Joey
Elon Musk
Elon Musk gives his most telling Tesla-SpaceX merger conversation yet
Elon Musk hinted a Tesla-SpaceX merger could be coming, and Wall Street is taking notice.
Elon Musk gave his clearest signal yet that Tesla and SpaceX could eventually combine, telling the All-In Summit in Los Angeles that the two companies’ deepening collaboration makes the question worth asking. Sawyer Merritt first surfaced the highlight on X Tuesday.
Asked directly why Tesla and SpaceX remain separate given how closely they already work together, Musk told hosts at the summit: “Great question there. With all this collaboration, on so many levels, who can imagine what action one might take when there’s so much close collaboration in so many areas.” SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell, who joined Musk on stage, added that SpaceX personnel have already moved into xAI to fill leadership and engineering gaps, saying the businesses are integrating “faster than I thought,” though “not fully integrated yet,”
The comments landed on top of merger speculation that has been building on Wall Street for months. JPMorgan has called a tie-up “strategically coherent on paper,” pointing to overlapping ambitions in AI, robotics, energy, transportation and space. Jefferies went further, estimating Musk could retain roughly 55.3 percent voting control in a deal structured without a premium, a scenario that would still leave room for Tesla shareholders to come out ahead. On Kalshi, traders now put the odds of a merger before 2028 at 66 percent.
Tesla’s stake in SpaceX, still under one percent, traces back to its earlier investment in xAI, which converted to SpaceX equity after SpaceX absorbed the AI company. The two are also jointly building Terafab, a chip facility in Austin meant to serve both Tesla’s AI computing needs and SpaceX’s satellite ambitions. Wedbush analyst Dan Ives has stood by a 2027 merger timeline for months, and Cathie Wood’s ARK Invest recently floated a similar case, an idea Musk pushed back on directly at the time.
Another Tesla SpaceX merger prediction by ARK Invest has Elon Musk talking
The timing adds another layer. Tesla has scheduled an October 1 unveiling for its next generation Roadster at a venue near SpaceX’s McGregor, Texas test site, using the phrase “Go for launch” in its promotional material. Both stocks dipped roughly 2 percent Monday before recovering slightly in premarket trading Tuesday, with SpaceX shares up about 0.4 percent and Tesla essentially flat.
Musk stopped short of confirming anything is in motion. But unlike his past denials of a corporate restructuring, this response didn’t rule one out, and it came with Shotwell sitting next to him describing an integration that’s already underway.
The Tesla Roadster unveiling is getting hyped up by the company’s CEO Elon Musk, who has been a big reason the product has such high expectations due to delayed timelines and a constant need to make it even more insane than before.
Tesla announced on September 12 that it would officially unveil the Roadster in Waco, Texas, on October 1, ending years of patience for fans and reservation holders who have waited for the all-electric supercar to enter production since 2017.
Musk has said that this event will be well worth the wait on several occasions, and last year on the Joe Rogan Experience, he said that there should be a closing chapter to supercars- the end of cars that aren’t focused on safety.
He said:
“Whether it’s good or bad, it will be unforgettable. My friend Peter Thiel once reflected that the future was supposed to have flying cars, but we don’t have flying cars. I think if Peter wants a flying car, he should be able to buy one. I think it has a shot at being the most memorable product unveil ever. This is some crazy technology in this car. Let’s just put it this way: if you took all the James Bond cars and combined them, it’s crazier than that.”
Musk’s teases have continued, and now that the event is roughly two weeks away, it seems like Roadster is finally going to show up and blow some minds:
It’s out of this world
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 13, 2026
Excitement guaranteed
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 13, 2026
Tesla has definitely dragged out the development of the Roadster, but there is a good reason for it.
Tesla has been working on many other projects, most notably self-driving efforts to increase passenger safety, and those simply took priority over the Roadster, a low-volume, high-performance sports car that has a lightning-fast acceleration rate of 0-60 MPH in just 1.1 seconds, could potentially fly, and contributes very little to the company’s mission.
However, many people have the Roadster on pre-order through the referral program or with their own money, and it is time that Tesla delivers on that.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk’s Boring Company has big plans for Las Vegas by year’s end
Elon Musk’s Boring Company says Vegas Loop stations will double by year end once again.
The Boring Company says the Vegas Loop’s station count will double by the end of the year, tying the target to a hiring push for drivers and operations managers in Las Vegas. “Vegas Loop is getting bigger – the station count will double by end of year!” the company wrote in a post on X, attaching listings for a Loop driver and a senior Loop operations manager.
The number checks out against what’s already public, with the Vegas Loop currently running 14 operational stations, while the Boring Company’s own project page lists 28 as the target for the end of 2026.
Vegas Loop is getting bigger – the station count will double by end of year!
Urgently hiring exceptional and enthusiastic Drivers and Ops Managers.
Apply here!
Driverhttps://t.co/ZUPXBYTONb
Senior Loop Ops Managerhttps://t.co/mV6V22V8jH pic.twitter.com/IZ9FqIw8WY
— The Boring Company (@boringcompany) September 14, 2026
Much of that growth is tied to tunnels that are already built and waiting on an opening date. A roughly two-mile dual tunnel system under Paradise Road, connecting Westgate to a planned station at 4744 Paradise Road, is expected to open in stages over the coming weeks, Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority chief executive Steve Hill told the Review-Journal last week. New stations at 4744 Paradise, Virgin Hotels Las Vegas, and the former Gordon Biersch site would come online with it, several of them built to speed up rides to Harry Reid International Airport ahead of Formula 1’s Las Vegas Grand Prix.
Clark County entitled Vegas Loop for 123 stations after approving 19 more in August, as Teslarati reported at the time. Entitlement and construction move at different speeds on this project, so county approval alone does not guarantee a station opens on any particular schedule.
Clark County approved 18 additional stations back in 2023, part of a plan that pushed the system’s target to 69 stations across 65 miles, doubling the network on paper for the first time. The target kept climbing after that, to roughly 93 stations by the end of that year and 104 by last year, before August’s vote pushed it to 123. This week’s announcement is the first time that doubling language has been attached to stations actually running rather than stations merely approved on a county map.
Ridership gives some sense of what a denser network could carry. Boring Company executive Mike Baier said in July that the Vegas Loop already moves around 40,000 passengers on busy convention days, a total that tops most light rail systems in the country despite the system running on a fraction of its planned tunnel mileage. Company leadership has projected ridership could triple or quadruple once the airport connector tunnels fully open.
Boring Company did not say which stations beyond those already under construction would open by year end, or whether the hiring push points to a fleet expansion alongside the new stops.
Elon Musk gives his most telling Tesla-SpaceX merger conversation yet
Tesla Roadster unveiling is getting hyped up by Elon Musk
