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Tesla dominates US luxury car segment in Kelly Blue Book’s Q2 2019 Brand Watch

(Credit: Harbles/Twitter)

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The results of the Q2 2019 Kelley Blue Book Brand Watch have revealed that the United States’ luxury vehicle segment is being dominated by Tesla, particularly its most disruptive vehicle to date, the Model 3 midsize sedan. 

As per the results of KBB’s recent report, the Tesla Model 3 was the most-considered luxury model in Q2 2019, up from No.6 in the first quarter. Even the Model S, a vehicle that has seen a decline in sales amidst the ongoing ramp of the Model 3, ranked well in KBB’s study, holding the No.8 spot on the most-shopped luxury vehicle list.  

Tesla was the sixth overall most-shopped luxury brand in the United States, with 14% of luxury vehicle shoppers considering one of the company’s existing offerings when purchasing a premium vehicle. This is a notable improvement from Tesla’s first-quarter results, which saw the company ranking 10th with 8% of luxury car shoppers considering a Model 3, Model S, or Model X. 

(Credit: Kelley Blue Book)

Tesla’s results from the Q2 2019 Kelley Blue Book Brand Watch are particularly impressive, especially considering that the company encountered challenges during the second quarter. Following lower-than-expected deliveries in Q1, Tesla was hit by a wave of negative sentiments that ranged from the alleged lack of demand for the Model 3 to a plummeting stock price. If the results of the KBB report are any indication, it appears that the notable negativity that surrounded Tesla in the second quarter did little to dent the company’s reputation among car buyers. 

This is particularly notable in the fact that Tesla also dominated the list of most important factors for consumers that are looking to purchase a vehicle, with the electric car maker capturing seven first-place spots out of 12 categories outlined in the report. As per KBB’s results, Tesla was considered as the top-ranked brand for driving comfort, driving performance, technology, interior layout, exterior styling, fuel efficiency, and prestige/sophistication. 

(Credit: Kelley Blue Book)

With these results, Kelley Blue Book noted that Tesla has now grown into one of the most formidable luxury brands in the United States. “Tesla is no longer an emerging brand, it has become one of the top performing luxury brands with 8% market share,” the KBB report noted.

Ultimately, the only categories in the Q2 2019 Kelley Blue Book Brand Watch where Tesla did not place in the top three spots included ruggedness, which is so far irrelevant to the brand considering that the company has no off-road vehicle to date; as well as affordability, which is only somewhat important for the mainstream-priced Tesla Model 3. Both these categories will likely be addressed by Tesla in the near future, with the Tesla Pickup Truck potentially catering to the rugged, utilitarian market, and Model 3 prices being further optimized amidst dropping battery prices.

The full results of the Q2 2019 Kelley Blue Book Brand Watch could be found below.

2019Q2 Brand Watch Luxury Topline by Simon Alvarez on Scribd

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Simon is an experienced automotive reporter with a passion for electric cars and clean energy. Fascinated by the world envisioned by Elon Musk, he hopes to make it to Mars (at least as a tourist) someday. For stories or tips--or even to just say a simple hello--send a message to his email, simon@teslarati.com or his handle on X, @ResidentSponge.

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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.

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Tesla Optimus Gen 3 [Credit: Tesla]

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.

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.

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.

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Elon Musk

SpaceX scores another massive Pentagon deal to support military satellites

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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.

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.

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Investor's Corner

SpaceX gets an absolutely crazy price target after rough IPO

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Credit: SpaceX

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.

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.

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