Has there been any discussion or thought around the idea that Tesla might 'rebrand' the Model 2 as something else? Sort of the reverse of what Honda and Toyota did with Lexus and Acura or Lladro does with Nao? I thought of this in the context of Elon saying range under 250 miles is unacceptable for a Tesla, but also in terms of how 'stripped down' or whatever it takes to hit the $25K price point. It seems to me maybe it would make sense to retain Tesla's premium image if the 'cheaper' version is going to be seriously downgraded.
OTOH, that's definitely old 'big auto' thinking and maybe the antithesis of everything Elon's trying to do. But realistically speaking unless he wants to cannibalize M3 and MY sales it seems like there has to be at least $20 - 25K worth of real difference between the cars and I'm not sure what a car with that much 'value' pulled out of it would look like and whether it could fit Elon's vision of what a 'Tesla' is supposed to be. And as we've already seen with standard range Y, he'd rather not issue a car at all rather than compromise his standards.
So I was just wondering if rebadging would be around that? T-Car or something, I don't know. I honestly don't see how you pull $15K of real cost out of the base Model 3 especially when pretty much all there is is to do is reduce the battery size and put in a weaker motor. He's not going to pull the cameras and processing and connectivity out because he needs all those sensors on the road feeding the super computer.
I guess it just depends on how 'degraded' the Model 2 will be and whether Elon can live with the Tesla logo on it.
OTOH, that's definitely old 'big auto' thinking and maybe the antithesis of everything Elon's trying to do. But realistically speaking unless he wants to cannibalize M3 and MY sales it seems like there has to be at least $20 - 25K worth of real difference between the cars and I'm not sure what a car with that much 'value' pulled out of it would look like and whether it could fit Elon's vision of what a 'Tesla' is supposed to be. And as we've already seen with standard range Y, he'd rather not issue a car at all rather than compromise his standards.
So I was just wondering if rebadging would be around that? T-Car or something, I don't know. I honestly don't see how you pull $15K of real cost out of the base Model 3 especially when pretty much all there is is to do is reduce the battery size and put in a weaker motor. He's not going to pull the cameras and processing and connectivity out because he needs all those sensors on the road feeding the super computer.
I guess it just depends on how 'degraded' the Model 2 will be and whether Elon can live with the Tesla logo on it.
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