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Nikola can ‘easily’ do all-electric trucks like Tesla Semi, says exec in interview
New Nikola Motor president Mark Russell recently provided some updates on the company’s efforts to establish its hydrogen refueling stations across the United States, as well as his thoughts about rivals like the Tesla Semi and other hybrid trucks like the modified Kenworth-Toyota T680 long-hauler that debuted at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas last January.
Russell, who used to serve as Worthington Industries’ president and chief operating officer, notes that Nikola is notably different from other ventures that he had been involved with in the past, thanks in part to the trucking startup’s pace. “We get so much done; it’s just dizzying,” he said.
Nikola Motor had changed directions several times over the past years. At one point, the company had announced plans for the production of a truck powered by hydrogen and natural gas, before shifting to an initiative aimed at developing hybrid battery-electric and fuel cell hydrogen long-haulers. Most recently, Nikola announced that it would also be producing battery-electric trucks, placing its vehicles in even more direct competition with the Tesla Semi, a vehicle that is expected to begin production late 2019 or sometime next year.
Speaking with trucking publication FreightWaves, Russell explained that the Tesla Semi would not be competing with its long-haul vehicles like the Nikola One, due to the Semi’s limited battery range. The Tesla Semi is offered at 300-mile and 500-mile variants, though Elon Musk has teased that improvements to the vehicle’s design will place the truck’s range closer to 600 miles per charge. This is impressive for a pure-electric truck, but still less than the range of the hydrogen-powered Nikola One, which is expected to have a range of over 1,000 miles. The Nikola President notes that the Tesla Semi is rather simple, and it is a vehicle that the trucking startup could easily do.
“Their truck is our truck with a bigger battery, and we can easily do that. It Nikola’s recent electric vehicle announcement is not as big a deal as people are making it out to be. It’s not a strategy shift. Our model is still attacking the long haul market. We will sell battery electric vehicles based on the same design, and they’ll be great vehicles for those applications. If Tesla can produce their truck and meet the specs, we’ll be competing with them in that market. Tesla doesn’t have anything to compete with us in long-haul,” he said.
Russell also asserted that Nikola would be producing all its hydrogen from renewable resources. The exec further added that the use of hydrogen, provided that it is drawn from renewable energy, is even more environmentally-friendly than the use of batteries to store energy.
“That’s the problem with renewables; they only generate when the wind blows, or the sun shines, and what do you do with them when you don’t need it? You have to store it. One solution is to buy expensive batteries that consume commodities scarce on this planet and then have hazardous waste when they are done. Or you can make hydrogen. Once you’ve made hydrogen and stored it, it can sit there forever. It doesn’t degrade. It doesn’t leak. And when you turn it back into electricity, it becomes water. It’s an elegant, beautiful, simple solution for storing energy, so much better than batteries. You break down water; you put it back together,” he said.
With regards to other hybrid trucks that have been unveiled recently, such as the modified Kenworth-Toyota T680 long-hauler that debuted at the CES, Russell proved mostly unimpressed, stating that such projects are more like a Frankenstein monster that’s cobbled together from existing components. The executive explained that Nikola’s trucks would be designed from the ground up to be environmentally-friendly vehicles, and this is something that will make them truly unique.
Nikola has a tendency to be quite protective of its vehicles. Last year, the trucking startup filed a lawsuit against Tesla claiming that the Semi’s design was copied from the Nikola One. Neither Nikola nor Tesla has issued an official update about the case so far. Nikola Motor is currently preparing for its Nikola World Exhibition this coming April 16-17, where the company is expected to showcase its vehicles like the Nikola Two daycab and the Nikola Tre, a vehicle designed for European markets.
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Tesla Model Y Standard Long Range RWD launches in Europe
The update was announced by Tesla Europe & Middle East in a post on its official social media account on X.
Tesla has expanded the Model Y lineup in Europe with the introduction of the Standard Long Range RWD variant, which offers an impressive 657 km of WLTP range.
The update was announced by Tesla Europe & Middle East in a post on its official social media account on X.
Model Y Standard Long Range RWD Details
Tesla Europe & Middle East highlighted some of the Model Y Standard Long Range RWD’s most notable specs, from its 657 km of WLTP range to its 2,118 liters of cargo volume. More importantly, Tesla also noted that the newly released variant only consumes 12.7 kWh per 100 km, making it the most efficient Model Y to date.
The Model Y Standard provides a lower entry point for consumers who wish to enter the Tesla ecosystem at the lowest possible price. While the Model 3 Standard is still more affordable, some consumers might prefer the Model Y Standard due to its larger size and crossover form factor. The fact that the Model Y Standard is equipped with Tesla’s AI4 computer also makes it ready for FSD’s eventual rollout to the region.
Top Gear’s Model Y Standard review
Top Gear‘s recent review of the Tesla Model Y Standard highlighted some of the vehicle’s most notable features, such as its impressive real-world range, stellar infotainment system, and spacious interior. As per the publication, the Model Y Standard still retains a lot of what makes Tesla’s vehicles well-rounded, even if it’s been equipped with a simplified interior.
Top Gear compared the Model Y Standard to its rivals in the same segment. “The introduction of the Standard trim brings the Model Y in line with the entry price of most of its closest competition. In fact, it’s actually cheaper than a Peugeot e-3008 and costs £5k less than an entry-level Audi Q4 e-tron. It also makes the Ford Mustang Mach-E look a little short with its higher entry price and worse range,” the publication wrote.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk’s xAI bets $20B on Mississippi with 2GW AI data center project
The project is expected to create hundreds of permanent jobs, dramatically expand xAI’s computing capacity, and further cement the Mid-South as a growing hub for AI infrastructure.
Elon Musk’s xAI plans to pour more than $20 billion into a massive new data center campus in Southaven, Mississippi, marking the largest single economic development project in the state’s history.
The project is expected to create hundreds of permanent jobs, dramatically expand xAI’s computing capacity, and further cement the Mid-South as a growing hub for AI infrastructure.
xAI goes MACROHARDRR in Mississippi
xAI has acquired and is retrofitting an existing facility in Southaven to serve as a new data center, which will be known as “MACROHARDRR.” The site sits near a recently acquired power plant and close to one of xAI’s existing data centers in Tennessee, creating a regional cluster designed to support large-scale AI training and inference.
Once completed, the Southaven facility is expected to push the company’s total computing capacity to nearly 2 GW, placing it among the most powerful AI compute installations globally. The data center is scheduled to begin operations in February 2026.
Gov. Tate Reeves shared his optimism about the project in a press release. “This record-shattering $20 billion investment is an amazing start to what is sure to be another incredible year for economic development in Mississippi. Today, Elon Musk is bringing xAI to DeSoto County, a project that will transform the region and bring amazing opportunities to its residents for generations. This is the largest economic development project in Mississippi’s history,” he said.
xAI’s broader AI ambitions
To secure the investment, the Mississippi Development Authority approved xAI for its Data Center Incentive program, which provides sales and use tax exemptions on eligible computing hardware and software. The City of Southaven and DeSoto County are also supporting the project through fee-in-lieu agreements aimed at accelerating development timelines and reducing upfront costs.
Founded in 2023 by Elon Musk, xAI develops advanced artificial intelligence systems focused on large-scale reasoning and generative applications. Its flagship product, Grok, is integrated with the social media platform X, alongside a growing suite of APIs for image generation, voice, and autonomous agents, including offerings tailored for government use.
Elon Musk highlighted xAi’s growth and momentum in a comment about the matter. “xAI is scaling at an immeasurable pace — we are building our third massive data center in the greater Memphis area. MACROHARDRR pushes our Colossus training compute to ~2GW – by far the most powerful AI system on Earth. This is insane execution speed by xAI and the state of Mississippi. We are grateful to Governor Reeves for his support of building xAI at warp speed,” Musk said.
Tesla’s Head of AI, Ashok Elluswamy, says that something that was expected with version 14.3 of the company’s Full Self-Driving platform has already partially shipped with the current build of version 14.2.
Tesla and CEO Elon Musk have teased on several occasions that reasoning will be a big piece of future Full Self-Driving builds, helping bring forth the “sentient” narrative that the company has pushed for these more advanced FSD versions.
Back in October on the Q3 Earnings Call, Musk said:
“With reasoning, it’s literally going to think about which parking spot to pick. It’ll drop you off at the entrance of the store, then go find a parking spot. It’s going to spot empty spots much better than a human. It’s going to use reasoning to solve things.”
Musk said in the same month:
“By v14.3, your car will feel like it is sentient.”
Amazingly, Tesla Full Self-Driving v14.2.2.2, which is the most recent iteration released, is very close to this sentient feeling. However, there are more things that need to be improved, and logic appears to be in the future plans to help with decision-making in general, alongside other refinements and features.
On Thursday evening, Elluswamy revealed that some of the reasoning features have already been rolled out, confirming that it has been added to navigation route changes during construction, as well as with parking options.
He added that “more and more reasoning will ship in Q1.”
🚨 Tesla’s Ashok Elluswamy reveals Nav decisions when encountering construction and parking options contain “some elements of reasoning”
More uses of reasoning will be shipped later this quarter, a big tidbit of info as we wait v14.3 https://t.co/jty8llgsKM
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) January 9, 2026
Interestingly, parking improvements were hinted at being added in the initial rollout of v14.2 several months ago. These had not rolled out to vehicles quite yet, as they were listed under the future improvements portion of the release notes, but it appears things have already started to make their way to cars in a limited fashion.
Tesla Full Self-Driving v14.2 – Full Review, the Good and the Bad
As reasoning is more involved in more of the Full Self-Driving suite, it is likely we will see cars make better decisions in terms of routing and navigation, which is a big complaint of many owners (including me).
Additionally, the operation as a whole should be smoother and more comfortable to owners, which is hard to believe considering how good it is already. Nevertheless, there are absolutely improvements that need to be made before Tesla can introduce completely unsupervised FSD.
Tesla Model Y Standard Long Range RWD launches in Europe
Elon Musk’s xAI bets $20B on Mississippi with 2GW AI data center project
