Tesla Semi goes into production with long awaited deliveries beginning in December
Production on Tesla’s long-delayed all-electric semi truck has started with the first deliveries beginning in December.
The carmaker introduced the all-electric prototype, dubbed Tesla Semi, during an event held in Hawthorne, California in 2017, on the grounds of the company’s design studio and Musk’s other company, SpaceX.
The reveal came more than a year after Tesla launched a trucks development program, which was steered by Jerome Guillen, a former Daimler executive who joined the company in 2010. Guillen left Tesla in 2021 just a few months after his position was changed from president of the company’s entire automotive business to a more narrow role leading Tesla’s heavy trucking unit.
Tesla initially planned to start producing the semi truck in December 2019. however the automaker pushed production of the Semi truck program to 2022 due to supply chain challenges and the limited availability of battery cells.
In January 2021, the company announced that is had finished engineering work on the Semi and was on track to begin deliveries that year. But even then Musk warned that the availability of battery cells could limit the company’s ability to produce the Semi.
The delays haven’t prevented the company from landing reservations, from some of the US’s largest users of heavy good vehicles, which were $5,000 at the unveiling including Anheuser-Busch, Pepsi, Walmart and UPS.
Musk tweeted that Pepsi, which ordered 100 trucks back in December 2017, will be the first customer to receive the vehicles with an expected delivery date of December 1st.
Prospective UK buyers can now place orders with deposits of £15,000 per vehicle, but it is unclear when delivery may commence.
The website, www.tesla.com/semi, quotes a base price of $180,000 (£147,000) for the 500 mile range version, but little other information other than its 0-60mph acceleration of 20 seconds at 36.3 tonnes.
