Elon Musk confirmed that he personally moved to Texas full time and revealed that the reason is to focus on Tesla Gigafactory Texas in Austin and SpaceX’s Starship development in south Texas.
As for the future of the electric automaker and rocket company in California, it is still unclear.
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Tesla hints at more SpaceX collaboration as it adds “spaceship” to future potential products to work on for its future designers.
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Tesla and SpaceX are ramping up their synergy effort with workers moving between Elon Musk’s two companies, battery purchases, and more. Expand
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In the latest example of cooperation between Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Tesla, the former appears to be using battery packs from the latter in their “Starship” prototype, a vehicle they hope will help humanity get to Mars. Expand
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SpaceX is preparing to make its first demo launches for NASA’s commercial crew mission program, which aims to bring back the capability for U.S. spacecraft to fly astronauts to space.
The rocket company plans to use Tesla Model X vehicles to bring the first astronauts flying in the Crew Dragon spacecraft to the launch pad. Expand
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Electrek (Seth and myself) are in Hawthorne today for the SpaceX Hyperloop Pod Competition where teams of engineers and students are going to try to break some speed records with prototype pods of this new mode of transportation.
We are going to bring you as much as possible through our social media platforms and this post is going to be the hub for the event.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk says that the automaker’s next-gen Roadster will have a ‘SpaceX package’, which will include “~10 small rocket thrusters.”
While it sounds like a joke, Musk has made other comments hinting at the plan actually being real. Expand
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SpaceX started building a satellite constellation for a space-based broadband internet service and there has been some speculation about Tesla using the network.
Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX’s President and COO, now contributes to that speculation by saying that ‘Tesla could use the network’ in a new interview. Expand
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Elon Musk’s vision for the Boring Company becomes clearer as the CEO reveals that he plans on combining the startup’s hyperloop technology with SpaceX’s plan to use its latest rocket program to create a transportation system to get anywhere on earth in less than an hour. Expand
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After the highly publicized Tesla Roadster launch on a Falcon Heavy, it looks like there’s going to be again some synergy between Elon Musk’s two main companies.
SpaceX is about to launch the first two prototypes for its satellite constellation to provide internet broadband services and Tesla is getting a ground station. Expand
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After this week’s planned Falcon Heavy test launch with a Tesla Roadster as ballast, the world was treated to some incredible images of the car, with driver, orbiting the Earth. Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk had the good sense to attach multiple cameras to the car so everyone could see what was happening up there, and the images did not disappoint.
Now, a couple days later, astronomers at an observatory on the ground have given us a different view of Starman and his Tesla Roadster – a tiny dot speeding along amongst the stars on its journey towards the asteroid belt.
Ahead of the launch, Elon Musk said that many unknown factors result in “about a 50% chance” that the Falcon Heavy demonstration flight fails and destroys his Tesla Roadster in the process.
Yet, the launch was actually successful and all three first stage boosters separated to propel the second stage with the Tesla Roadster into space. Expand
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A day ahead of the planned demonstration launch of SpaceX’s new Falcon Heavy rocket, CEO Elon Musk released a simulation video of a Tesla Roadster, the demonstration payload, going to Mars. Expand
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Elon Musk’s unbelievable plan to use his own Tesla Roadster as the demonstration payload for the inaugural test launch of SpaceX’s new rocket, the Falcon Heavy, is reportedly set to happen on February 6. Expand
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Tesla has delivered yet another Powerpack project and this time, it’s a lot closer to home and yet it could help send things far away from earth.
SpaceX’s new rocket launch site in Texas is getting a new energy storage system from Tesla. Expand
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We have recently seen increasing numbers of collaborations between Tesla and SpaceX, two companies co-founded and led by Elon Musk.
Now an analyst suggests that the two companies could nurture an even closer relationship over time, including “possible strategic partnerships, technology transfer, co-investment and potentially a combination.” Expand
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In today’s installment of “is Elon Musk actually a crazy person,” he has announced on Twitter that the payload of the first SpaceX falcon heavy rocket will be his personal “midnight cherry” Tesla Roadster.
In tribute to David Bowie, the plan is for the car to be playing “Space Oddity” on its speakers during the launch.
Update: the article has been updated to reflect the fact that while Musk’s and the Rive brothers’ solar bonds were discharged like everyone else’s, they were transferred to regular bonds under the same terms.
SolarCity launched a Solar Bond Program in 2014. It was presented as an interesting way for people to invest in solar with minimum cost requirements and without having to install panels on their roof. Elon Musk himself, his cousins and SolarCity co-founders Lyndon and Peter Rive, and Musk’s rocket company, SpaceX, ended up being the biggest buyers in the program.
Now we learn that Tesla is discharging most of its solar bonds ahead of the maturity date and paying back all the principal with interests for the life of the bonds – though not for Musk and his cousins. Expand
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Last year, we reported that Tesla’s Chief Information Officer Jay Vijayan quietly left in January 2016 and his position stayed mostly vacant until now.
Gary Clark, who was IT CTO and Engineering CIO at Juniper until recently, joined Tesla over the last month to take over the automaker’s IT department. Expand
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SpaceX held a Hyperloop Pod Competition this weekend at their facility in Hawthorne, CA, and earlier today Elon gave the crowd a short speech talking about transportation innovation, efficiency, and his new “boring” company focused on building tunnels to alleviate traffic, showing that his recent focus on tunnels is probably related to how he sees hyperloop developing as underground, rather than overground, transport.
SpaceX is holding the last phase of its first ‘Hyperloop Pod Competition’ this weekend at its headquarters in Hawthorne, California. Surprisingly and despite some startups making significant progress, this mostly-student competition could represent the most advanced hyperloop technology demonstration since Elon Musk first published the idea back in 2013. Expand
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Tesla has hidden some pretty cool Easter Eggs in its software before – from changing your Model S into a James Bond amphibian car to a Mario Kart animation on Autopilot – but the latest Easter Egg on the update Tesla started pushing today is from another planet…. literally.
CEO Elon Musk added an Easter Egg to jokingly ship your car to Mars on SpaceX’s Interplanetary Transport System (ITS) – something Musk revealed in September as part of his plans to colonize Mars. Expand
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A right-wing propaganda group led by one of Donald Trump’s top propagandists recently launched a campaign called ‘Stop Elon From Failing Again’. According to their manifesto, the initiative aims to stop Elon Musk from “defrauding” American taxpayers through his companies, Tesla and SpaceX.
The effort is backed by conservative public relations specialists and Trump insiders that are funded by fossil fuel interests. Unsurprisingly, it is full of misinformation about Tesla, electric vehicles, and solar energy. Expand
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When Elon Musk promised to back Tesla’s resale value guarantee program with his own fortune or to pay back SolarCity’s debt himself if needs be, some criticized that if it came to it, it would be difficult for him to do so since his fortune is mostly tied to those companies.
There was always his stake in SpaceX, his rocket company, but the value of it and his precise stake in the company was unknown… until today. Expand
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