Investor's Corner
Tesla Model 3 in $35k Standard trim will have an AWD Dual Motor option
Tesla confirmed on Friday that the $35,000 Standard trim Model 3 could be upgraded with a dual motor AWD option.
The dual motor AWD upgrade costs $5,000 for the Long Range RWD version of the electric car. If Tesla does not adjust its pricing for the upgrade, a Standard trim Model 3 with dual motor AWD would likely be priced around $40,000. In comparison, Tesla’s Long Range Model 3 with dual motor AWD is priced at $54,000 before additional options such as premium paint, 19″ Sport Wheels, and Autopilot.
Yes
— Tesla (@Tesla) August 9, 2018
Tesla’s $35,000 Standard trim Model 3 is arguably one of the most anticipated vehicles in the company’s lineup. When Elon Musk wrote his Master Plan back in 2006, he mentioned using the money earned from the sales of medium-volume cars like the Model S and X to fund the development and release of an affordable, high-volume car. The Model 3 is that vehicle — a car designed to push Tesla into the mainstream car market. The $35,000 starting price of the Standard trim Model 3 is a huge draw to the vehicle, helping Tesla hit its record-breaking reservation numbers when it was unveiled back in 2016.
It could be said that the $35,000 base Model 3 is Tesla’s most ambitious vehicle to date. While it does not have all the bells and whistles of its more expensive siblings like the Model 3 Performance, the base Model 3 is still a capable electric car. Its battery pack, comprised of Tesla’s new 2170 cells, is expected to provide the vehicle with 220 miles of range per charge. The speed of the Standard trim Model 3 is not to be scoffed at, either, with its 0-60 mph time of 5.6 seconds and a top speed of 130 mph. The base Model 3 is also fitted with Tesla’s industry-leading safety systems, including 8 cameras, forward radar, and 12 ultrasonic sensors that enable features such as collision avoidance and automatic emergency braking.
Inasmuch as the $35,000 Standard trim Model 3 would likely be a huge success when it enters the market, Tesla’s production rollout for the vehicle has experienced delays as the company faced challenge after challenge over the past year. Musk explained these delays in an update on Twitter last May, when he stated that if Tesla manufactures the $35,000 Model 3 while the company’s production output is not optimized yet, it will cause Tesla to lose money.
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With production, 1st you need achieve target rate & then smooth out flow to achieve target cost. Shipping min cost Model 3 right away wd cause Tesla to lose money & die. Need 3 to 6 months after 5k/wk to ship $35k Tesla & live.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 21, 2018
An update to the $35,000 Standard trim Model 3 was announced by Elon Musk on the 2018 Annual Shareholder Meeting, when he stated that production of the Standard trim’s smaller battery pack would likely begin sometime at the end of the year. Musk also suggested that the vehicle would probably see a release in early 2019.
“Yes. We will definitely offer a $35,000 version of the Model 3. And probably at the end of this year is when we will be able to make a smaller version of the battery pack, and get into volume production of $35,000 version in Q1 next year. We would definitely honor that obligation, and we would do so right now if it were possible,” Musk said.
Tesla only makes three variants of the Model 3 today — the Long Range RWD, Dual Motor AWD, and Performance versions — but the vehicle is already starting to make an impact in the United States’ auto industry. In July alone, the Model 3 ranked seventh in GoodCarBadCar‘s list of America’s Top 20 best-selling vehicles list, which includes gas-powered cars like the Toyota Camry. Once the $35,000 Standard trim Model 3 enters the fray, Tesla’s newest electric car would likely command an even bigger piece of the car market.
Elon Musk
Tesla AI boss reveals how big Optimus is going to get
Tesla’s Optimus chief corrected himself on X, confirming a staggering 10 million robot production target.
![Tesla Optimus Gen 3 [Credit: Tesla]](https://www.teslarati.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/tesla-optimus-gen3-diner.jpg)
Tesla’s Optimus program has a new number attached to it, after Ashok Elluswamy, the executive who has run the humanoid robot program since June 2025, posted a three word correction on X Thursday, “Correction, 10 million robots.”
The line clarifies the long term annual capacity Tesla is building toward its planned second Optimus production line at Gigafactory Texas, a figure Musk has cited repeatedly since last year’s shareholder meeting.
The scale is worth noting, because ten million robots a year would mean Tesla building more units annually than most countries sell in new cars. Tesla has framed this as a second line, not the first. The buildout is happening in two phases: a roughly one million unit per year line inside Tesla’s Fremont factory, installed on the floor space vacated when Model S and Model X production ended earlier this year, and a much larger dedicated facility under construction at Giga Texas that broke ground on its first steel structure in May. That Texas facility is the one Elluswamy’s correction refers to, and is expected to reach volume production sometime in 2027.
Correction, 10 million robots https://t.co/0z4nyQNTzp
— Ashok Elluswamy (@aelluswamy) July 30, 2026
Tesla Optimus project fires up as Musk sees production line progress
Elluswamy took over Optimus from Milan Kovac last summer and has spent the months since talking up the program’s trajectory. Elon Musk has also floated the ten million figure at Tesla’s 2025 shareholder meeting.
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Ending Model S and Model X production to make room for the first Optimus line was one of the more consequential manufacturing decisions in the company’s recent history, retiring two flagship vehicles in favor of a robot that has yet to enter mass production. Musk has previously estimated per unit production costs at $20,000 to $25,000 once Tesla reaches a million units a year, though he hasn’t said what that cost looks like at ten times the volume.
SpaceX just picked up another $1.6 billion from the Pentagon, with the U.S. Space Force awarding two task orders worth $1.6 billion to fly 18 Falcon 9 missions from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California through the end of 2027. The launches will carry satellites for the Space Based Sensing and Targeting portfolio, a set of programs meant to help the military detect and track airborne threats and relay that information across forces in near real time.
The award falls under National Security Space Launch Phase 3 Lane 1, the Space Force’s faster, commercial style procurement track for missions that do not require the military’s most demanding certification process. It is also the largest single order publicly disclosed under that program so far, and the first task order issued since the Space Force nearly tripled Lane 1’s contract ceiling from $5.6 billion to $17 billion on July 17.
SpaceX to become America’s Military data backbone for missiles, drones, and warfighters
Eric Zarybnisky, the Space Force’s acting portfolio acquisition executive for space access, said the entire process, from identifying the requirement to signing the contract, took about two months, including a month set aside for companies to prepare proposals.
SpaceX is not just launching these satellites. It already holds the contracts to build two of the programs within the same portfolio, $4.16 billion for the Space Based Airborne Moving Target Indicator system and $2.29 billion for the Space Data Network Backbone, which Teslarati covered in May. That means SpaceX is now responsible for both building key pieces of the military’s next generation sensing network and getting them into orbit.
With this latest award, SpaceX’s Pentagon contract total for 2026 alone tops $8 billion, adding to a defense portfolio that already includes the Golden Dome missile defense software group SpaceX joined in April and a string of GPS launches it inherited after ULA’s Vulcan rocket ran into a booster anomaly, which we detailed in March.
Lane 1’s vendor pool technically includes seven companies: SpaceX, ULA, Blue Origin, Rocket Lab, Stoke Space, Impulse Space, and Relativity Space. In practice, SpaceX remains the only provider with the combination of launch cadence, flight proven Falcon 9 hardware, and West Coast infrastructure to support a campaign requiring roughly one Vandenberg launch a month for the next year and a half.
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Some lawmakers have flagged the growing concentration of national security launches with one company as a risk worth watching. For now, the Space Force keeps backing SpaceX, with it being the company that shows up ready to launch.
SpaceX (NASDAQ: SPCX) got an absolutely crazy price target rating from Raymond James after the company experienced a tough first few weeks following its Initial Public Offering (IPO).
Despite the tumultuous start, SpaceX has plenty of believers, and the company’s massively successful Starship launch last Friday, its 13th test flight of the massive rocket, went so smoothly that Raymond James analysts pushed its price target on the company to roughly 7 times its current trading level.
SpaceX Starship just nailed something it’s never done before
The firm officially put a “Strong Buy” rating and an $800 price target on the stock. It currently trades at around $113. Its all-time high is $225.64, reaching this trading level shortly after shares first went public.
Raymond James’ price target is tied to the firm’s confidence after Starship’s 13th test flight. Analysts at the firm said it was an incremental step that reduces engineering risks, citing the widely successful heat shield test that CEO Elon Musk recently detailed, the smooth deployment of Starlink V3 satellites, and a successful in-space engine relight.
SpaceX also managed to see Starship splash down safely in the Indian Ocean, while the Super Heavy Booster fell down to the Gulf of America with no incidents.
It is interesting to see these launches have such a tremendous impact on the stock and what investors think of it. After SpaceX initially delayed the Starship launch last week, shares fell tremendously. Most probably did not realize that the stand-down is a standard practice, especially if everything is not perfect.
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The mission was initially aborted due to an issue with Raptor engines. This was resolved, and Starship launched last Friday after another delay on Thursday, which was caused by weather.
Now that analysts have seen what SpaceX launches are capable of and how impressive the feat is, firms are adjusting their price targets accordingly, making it known that they have high expectations for the space exploration company.
Tesla Model Y L’s new features flexed at unveiling event at Diner
Tesla CEO Elon Musk denies ridiculous Gigafactory Shanghai rumor
![Tesla Optimus Gen 3 [Credit: Tesla]](https://www.teslarati.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/tesla-optimus-gen3-diner-80x80.jpg)
