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Global EV giant Tesla officially made its entry in India on Tuesday with the launch of its first experience centre at the Maker Maxity Commercial Complex, in Bandra Kurla Complex here.The experience centre was inaugurated by Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis in the presence of other dignitaries.
Tesla has made its India debut at a time when it is facing reduced sales in Europe and China. When the dream of Tesla was born, electric cars were still considered futuristic concepts. Today, however, Tesla has revolutionized the automobile industry with the help of energy, artificial intelligence, and even space technology. Tesla is now seen as one of the world’s most innovative companies.
The name “Tesla” immediately brings the image of Elon Musk in everyone’s mind. In fact, Musk is now almost a synonym with the brand. But surprisingly, he wasn’t the founder of Tesla. He entered the company as an investor.
Whenever the world talks about electric vehicles (EVs), Tesla comes in tops the list. But Elon Musk didn’t start this company but two engineers did. Tesla began on July 1, 2003, when engineers Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning co-founded Tesla Motors. Their goal was to create an electric car that wouldn’t harm the environment the way petrol or diesel vehicles do.
Being engineers, they were very much passionate about technology. At the time, their vision of EVs was considered highly impractical. But the duo stayed committed to their idea and named the company in honor of the great inventor Nikola Tesla, who discovered alternating current (AC). From the beginning, Tesla wanted to build emission-free, fast, and stylish electric vehicles.
The story took a major turn in 2004 with the entry of Elon Musk. By then, Musk had already made a name for himself as the founder of SpaceX and PayPal. In Tesla’s Series A funding round, Musk invested $6.5 million and became the Chairman. Gradually, Musk took over responsibilities related to product design, vision, and marketing.
In 2008, when Tesla was on the brink of bankruptcy, Musk emerged as its savior by taking over as CEO. Though initially just an investor, Musk became Tesla’s CEO and later even acquired the title of co-founder. Eberhard had filed a defamation lawsuit against Musk, but in 2009, the verdict went in Musk’s favor.
In 2008, Tesla launched its first car, the Roadster. It was a high-performance sports car that was fully electric. It could accelerate from 0 to 100 km/h in just 3.9 seconds and offered a 320 km range on a single charge. The Roadster broke the myth that electric cars had to be slow or boring as it was fast, and powerful.
In fact, Musk even launched his own Roadster into space aboard a SpaceX rocket in 2018. That car is still orbiting the Earth today.
Musk later created a strategy for Tesla called S3XY, which included the following models:
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