It is ironic that Nikola denounces Tesla when both companies use the same person’s name and surname, but that’s the way things are. The truth is that the first truck of zero emissions that was presented was the Nikola One, moved by hydrogen, and after him, Tesla announced the first images of Tesla Semi, his electric truck. Now Nikola demands Tesla for the plagiarism of at least 3 elements of the One in the Semi:
The overall design of the cabin
The design of the windshield
The design of the access door
The truth is that if we see the images ofTesla Semiand of the Nikola One there is an indisputable resemblance, but, if we look at almost any truck that we see daily on the roads, the windshields and doors of all of them are also virtually identical.
What Nikola claims is that she launched her hydrogen truck in May 2016, 72 days before Tesla did the same with the Semi and that, due to the enormous resemblance between both trucks, there has been confusion among potential customers, subtracting prominence to One in favor of the Semi, which has made him lose sales.
Both trucks should be ready for its arrival in the market in 2019, but we will have to see what happens with this complaint.
Tesla in red with 653 million losses in 3 months
This complaint comes at a hard time for the automotive division of Elon Musk. In the first quarter of 2018, Tesla recorded net losses of 784.6 million dollars (653 million euros at the current rate). With these figures, the brand of electric cars almost doubles the red numbers of the same period of the previous year.
The company closed the first quarter of the current year with a turnover of 3,408 million dollars (2,840 million euros), which translates into a progression of 26.4% compared to the same period of the previous year.
Between January and March of this year, the corporation recorded a loss before taxes of 779.02 million dollars (649 million euros), which represents a strong increase of 109% with respect to the data for that period of the previous year.
The company’s revenues in the first quarter of the year benefited from the sales of the Model 3, although its quarterly results also suffered the impact of industrialization and production delays of this model.
The Tesla Model 3 continues to increase its production
From Tesla they indicated that in April they achieved that the production of the Model 3 reached 2,270 units a week, managing to overcome the barrier of the 2,000 Model 3 weekly for the fourth consecutive week.
“Despite being in a launching stage, the Model 3 is on the cusp to become the best-selling medium-size premium sedan in the United States,” said the company based in Palo Alto (California).
Tesla explained that, if his plans are met, the forecast is to achieve net profit in both the third and the fourth quarter of this year, based on his ability to reach a production volume of 5,000 weekly units of the Model 3.
“Once we reach the milestone of 5,000 units a week, we will try to incorporate our learning to continue increasing production in our existing industrial lines beyond 5,000 units a week, and after an efficient form of capital we will add capacity to achieve the figure of 10,000 weekly units “.
Rubén Fidalgo for Autocasión.com