Connect with us

News

Tesla is building a team to explore new materials like the Cybertruck’s steel exoskeleton

(Credit: Tesla Cybertruck/Instagram)

Published

on

Tesla is planning to build a new team that will help explore the use of new materials that can be used in the company’s products, according to one of the automaker’s lead engineers. One great example of this is the Tesla Cybertruck that will utilize a stainless steel alloy for its exoskeleton.

Tesla has long worked to experiment with new materials for its vehicles, refining the processes it uses to create highly effective and safe cars for consumers to drive. The biggest and most obvious example of this was with the Tesla Cybertruck. When Tesla unveiled the all-electric pickup in November 2019, the company revealed that the exoskeleton of the vehicle would be made of an extremely strong and robust stainless steel alloy. The same goes for SpaceX’s Starship. Tesla CEO Elon Musk told Teslarati in mid-2020 that it would be utilizing “rapidly changing alloy constituents & forming methods, so traditional names like 304L will become more of an approximation.” He confirmed that the materials used with the Cybertruck wouldn’t remain stagnant either, and when stronger materials or forming methods were found, Tesla would use them.

Now, Tesla is committing an entire team of engineers to the development of new, stronger materials, according to David Nelson, who said he is moving to a new role on the Materials Engineering team at Tesla.

Nelson said via his LinkedIn:

“I have moved on from leading the design of motors and gearboxes to a new role on the Materials Engineering team at Tesla. The idea is to accelerate the adoption of new materials and processes – helping to bridge the gap between materials science and part design. This is a new team that I get to build from scratch! It’s a chance to do advanced development with world-class materials scientists and product design teams. If you are a broadly-talented design engineer please take a look at this job posting and apply.”

Advertisement

Tesla Cybertruck pays visit to Gigafactory Texas with Elon Musk behind the wheel

Electrek originally found the posting.

As Nelson mentioned, the team is brand new, and Tesla recently erected the team to expand its efforts to discover new materials. In fact, the company recently added a new job to its Careers page that applies to the positions Nelson mentioned. The company writes:

“The purpose of the Materials Applications Team is to accelerate the adoption of new materials and processes at Tesla. Our goal is to work on problems that make step changes in the optimal design space. As a Design Engineer on the team, you will bridge the gap between materials science and part design. That can mean many different things depending on the material or process. On any given day you might design prototype tooling to make trial parts, work with vendors to perfect a process, perform large design space studies to see how a new material impacts mass and cost, or work in the lab to characterize a part or system.”

Tesla’s focus on experimenting with new materials has taken a new bit of momentum with the new team and job posting. It will be interesting to see how this affects the development of the Cybertruck because the production of the pickup is expected to begin later this year.

Advertisement

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

Advertisement
Comments

News

Tesla rolling out Robotaxi pilot in SF Bay Area this weekend: report

Similar to the Austin pilot, the Robotaxi rides will reportedly be a paid service.

Published

on

Credit: @AdanGuajardo/X

Tesla is reportedly preparing to launch a Robotaxi pilot program in the Bay Area this weekend, with invites to a select number of customers reportedly being sent out as early as this Friday.

The update was shared in a report from Insider, which cited an internal memo from the electric vehicle maker.

New Robotaxi service launch

According to Insider, the Robotaxi service in the Bay Area is set to launch as soon as Friday. Thus, some Tesla owners in the area should receive invites to use the driverless ride-hailing service. Similar to the Austin pilot, the Robotaxi rides will reportedly be a paid service.

The publication noted that the Robotaxi service’s geofence in its Bay Area launch will be quite large, as it will include Marin, much of the East Bay, San Francisco, and San Jose. This is not surprising as California has long been saturated with Teslas, and it is home to several of the electric vehicle maker’s key facilities.

Unlike the Austin pilot, the Tesla Robotaxi service’s pilot in the Bay Area will use safety drivers seated in the driver’s seat. These drivers will be able to manually take over using the steering wheel and brakes as needed. As per a spokesperson from the California DMV, the agency recently met with Tesla but the company is yet to submit a formal application to operate fully driverless cars. 

Advertisement

Tesla Robotaxi expansion

Interestingly enough, Tesla did tease the release of its Robotaxi service to the Bay Area in its second quarter earnings call. While discussing the service, Tesla VP of Autopilot/AI Software Ashok Elluswamy mentioned that the company will initially be rolling out Robotaxis with safety drivers in the San Francisco Bay Area. He did, however, also highlight that the electric vehicle maker is working hard to get government permission to release the service for consumers.

“The next thing to expand would be in the San Francisco Bay Area. We are working with the government to get approval here and, in the meanwhile, launch the service without the person in the driver seat just to expedite and while we wait for regulatory approval,” he stated.

Continue Reading

News

Tesla is ready with a perfect counter to the end of US EV tax credits

Tesla executives have mentioned that these more affordable models would resemble the company’s current lineup.

Published

on

Credit: Tesla Asia/X

The United States’ electric vehicle tax credit is coming to an end at the end of the third quarter. Tesla, the country’s leading electric vehicle maker, is ready to meet this challenge with a rather simple but clever counter. 

Tesla executives outlined this strategy in the recently held Q2 2025 earnings call.

End of the US EV tax credit

While Elon Musk has always maintained that he prefers a market with no EV tax credit, he also emphasized that he supports the rollback of any incentives given to the oil and gas industry. The Trump administration has not done this so far, instead focusing on the expiration of the $7,500 EV tax credit at the end of the third quarter.

Tesla has been going all-in on encouraging customers to purchase their vehicles in Q3 to take advantage of lower prices. The company has also implemented a series of incentives across all its offerings, from the Cybertruck to the Model 3. This, however, is not all, as the company seems to be preparing a longer-term solution to the expiration of the EV tax credit.

Affordable variants

During the Q2 2025 earnings call, Vice President of Vehicle Engineering Lars Moray stated that Tesla really did start the production of more affordable models in June. Quality builds of these vehicles are being ramped this quarter, with the goal of optimizing production over the remaining months of the year. If Tesla is successful, these models will be available for everyone in Q4. 

Advertisement

“We started production in June, and we’re ramping quality builds and things around the quarter. And given that we started in North America and our goal is to maximize production with a higher rate. So starting Q3, we’re going to keep pushing hard on our current models to avoid complexity… We’ll be ready with new, more affordable models available for everyone in Q4.,” Moravy stated. 

These comments suggest that Tesla should be able to offer vehicles that are competitively priced even after the EV tax credit has been phased out. Interestingly enough, previous comments from Tesla executives have mentioned that these more affordable models would resemble the company’s current lineup. This suggests that the more affordable models may indeed be variations of the Model Y and Model 3, but offered at a lower price.

Continue Reading

Elon Musk

Elon Musk reveals Tesla’s next Robotaxi expansion in more ways than one

Tesla Robotaxi is growing in more ways than one. Tesla wants to expand and hopes to reach half the U.S. population by the end of the year.

Published

on

Credit: Tesla

Tesla CEO Elon Musk revealed the company’s plans for its next expansion of the Robotaxi in terms of both the geofence in Austin and the platform overall, as it looks to move to new areas outside of Texas.

Tesla launched the Robotaxi platform last month on June 22, and has since expanded both the pool of users and the area that the driverless Model Y vehicles can travel within.

The first expansion of the geofence caught the attention of nearly everyone and became a huge headline as Tesla picked a very interesting shape for the new geofence, resembling male reproductive parts.

The next expansion will likely absolve this shape. Musk revealed last night that the new geofence will be “well in excess of what competitors are doing,” and it could happen “hopefully in a week or two.”

Musk’s full quote regarding the expansion of the geofence and the timing was:

“As some may have noted, we have already expanded our service area in Austin. It’s bigger and longer, and it’s going to get even bigger and longer. We are expecting to greatly increase the service area to well in excess of what competitors are doing, hopefully in a week or two.”

The expansion will not stop there, either. As Tesla has operated the Robotaxi platform in Austin for the past month, it has been working with regulators in other areas, like California, Arizona, Nevada, and Florida, to get the driverless ride-hailing system activated in more U.S. states.

Tesla confirmed that they are in talks with each of these states regarding the potential expansion of Robotaxi.

Musk added:

“As we get the approvals and prove out safety, we will be launching the autonomous ride-hailing across most of the country. I think we will probably have autonomous ride-hailing in probably half the population of the US by the end of the year.”

We know that Tesla and Musk have been prone to aggressive and sometimes outlandish timelines regarding self-driving technology specifically. Regulatory approvals could happen by the end of the year in several areas, and working on these large metros is the best way to reach half of the U.S. population.

Tesla said its expansion of the geofence in Austin is conservative and controlled due to its obsession with safety, even admitting at one point during the Earnings Call that they are being “paranoid.” Expanding the geofence is necessary, but Tesla realizes any significant mistake by Robotaxi could take it back to square one.

Continue Reading

Trending