FUTURE REPORT / Tesla Cybertruck
TESLA CYBERTRUCK
Following the reveal of the Tesla Cybertruck in November last year, the Tesla fanboys were left as confused as the naysayers felt buoyed. The fanboys were left grabbing at straws as they scoured the specs in their desperate search for something to redeem the Cybertruck from its “ugly” appearance. The naysayers again trumpeted the same old thesis that at last Elon Musk had revealed a dead duck destined for failure. Both were wrong because they failed to see the essence of what the Cybertruck represents.
The Tesla Cybertruck is not just another pickup truck – it’s much more than that. It is a multi-utility vehicle that sweeps across the entire landscape of vehicle categories and classes as it offers classleading features in virtually every category and class. Let’s break it down:
BEAUTY AND BEAST?
The Cybertruck is both beauty and beast, and from a design perspective it’s both brutalist and cyberpunk. More than anything though, it’s a functional design, both in terms of utility and manufacturing.
The design is arguably the best example of Elon Musk’s deep commitment to first principle thinking, starting with a blank canvas and asking just one question – what is true of a pickup truck? The result is a pickup truck stripped of all assumptions as generally expressed in the design and styling of modern pickup trucks. There is nothing on the Cybertruck that does not add to its function, so form follows function in the most extreme fashion.
The same first principles thinking is applied to the manufacturing of the Cybertruck, which means that the form also follows manufacturing function. As such the design of the Cybertruck maintains a critical balance between the utility of the vehicle itself and the manufacturing of thousands of the same vehicle. And herein lies the genius of the Cybertruck.
The choice of a unibody design using an exoskeleton manufactured from stainless steel marks two boxes that are critical. Firstly, it ensures an integrated and robust unibody that is virtually indestructible. Secondly it ensures a relatively cheap and simple manufacturing process that allows for more automation. This is profound, and the implications for the future of all vehicle manufacturing is equally profound. We will be as bold as to claim that one day all vehicles will look like this and be manufactured like this.
And as for the looks of the Cybertruck – it’s beautiful when draped in the South African flag, our special homage to Elon Musk’s origins.
THE ULTIMATE MULTI-PURPOSE VEHICLE
Since the reveal of the Cybertruck, most analysts have been comparing it to other pickup trucks and its potential market share in the highly lucrative pickup truck segment in North America. With more than 300,000 orders in the first two weeks following its reveal, the Cybertruck should be able to gain at least a 5% market share of the U.S. pickup truck segment, which translates to only about 150,000 units per
year. Tesla has not yet revealed where the Cybertruck will be manufactured but, given its growing, yet still limited manufacturing capacity, they would be hard pressed to produce more than 500,000 units per year globally when in full production. In comparison, Ford sells more than 1 million units of the F-Series per year in North America, so any talk of world domination by the Cybertruck is premature.
However, the traditional pickup truck segment represents only a fraction of what is potentially a much broader appeal of the Cybertruck as a true multi-utilty vehicle. Design and styling aside, at a price point of less than $40,000, the Cybertruck represents a compelling alternative for almost any other passenger vehicle. It’s quicker than most sports cars, it has more power, torque and towing capacity than any other pickup truck, it’s bigger and more spacious than most SUVs, it has better offroad capability than any other 4x4, it offers more practical utility than the average sedan or crossover utility and, given Tesla’s record of producing the safest vehicles on the planet, the Cybertruck is bound to be safer than any other competitive brand. And on top of all that, the total cost of ownership over a five-year period for a Cybertruck will be comparable to that of any other $30,000 internal combustion engine vehicle.
THE IDEAL COMMERCIAL VEHICLE
Even in the unlikely event that the Cybertruck fails to realise any consumer demand, either as a pickup truck or as a multi-utility vehicle, its success is virtually guaranteed as a commercial vehicle. Commercial vehicle purchases are based solely on cost, utility and longevity, with aesthetics counting for very little, except for company branding on the vehicles.
The Cybertruck ticks all the boxes for a commercial vehicle, and then some. Low charging cost (up to 70% cheaper than fossil fuels) and extremely low maintenance cost (as much as 90% less than ICE vehicles) make a compelling financial argument in favour of the Cybertruck. However, the Cybertruck’s true potential to disrupt the commercial vehicle market lies in its longevity. Even with Tesla’s current battery architecture, the Cybertruck will last at least 1.2 million km, and more than 1.6 million km with Tesla’s upcoming million-mile battery architecture.
Rahul Sonnad, CEO and Co-Founder of Tesloop, a car rental and rideshare company that specialises in Teslas, recently revealed that Tesloop has ordered 50 Cybertrucks, double its existing fleet. Explaining Tesloop’s choice of next generation Tesla vehicle, Sonnad listed low operating cost, utility (passengers and cargo), and Tesla’s million-mile battery as the primary reasons. What is important here is to note that Sonnad views the Cybertruck not as a pickup truck, but rather as a multi-utility vehicle, ideal for car rental, ridesharing and cargo hauling, all at the cost of a Tesla Model 3.
Elon Musk has bigger dreams, and with Tesla leading the race towards autonomous cars, the advent of Tesla’s Robotaxi service is a matter of when, not if. And when the fleet wakes up with an over-the-air update, as Musk famously predicted in early 2019, you can bet that the Cybertruck with its virtually indestructability body and powertrain will feature prominently in Tesla’s autonomous fleet, perhaps as the Cybertaxi.
The Cybertruck is a commercial vehicle that will last for decades, with no dents, no scratches, and no rust, and it’s the ideal canvas for branding. As a moving billboard, it will remain unmatched for a very long time. From police and military applications to construction and delivery applications, and everything in between, the Cybertruck looks set to become the great commercial vehicle sector disruptor.
LAST WORD
When it goes into production in late 2020, the Cybertruck will be the most versatile, most efficient, and safest vehicle to move people and cargo across virtually any route or terrain. Its beauty lies in its utility, and as such it is poised to become an economic masterpiece of engineering and manufacturing.