Tesla teases new Roadster reveal for October 1: ‘Go for launch’ — SkimNews
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- Tesla posted a 'Go for launch' teaser Friday with the date '10.01' stamped across it, nine years after unveiling the Roadster prototype in November 2017 with promised 2020 production.
- Elon Musk told shareholders last November that production wouldn't start until '2027 or 2028,' after Tesla had moved the goalpost at least eight times from the original 2020 target.
- The Roadster 'flying' demo has been scaled back from a wild version featuring a magnetized ramp and upside-down driving to a simpler remote-operated hover, with spectators kept hundreds of yards back because the SpaceX-developed cold gas thrusters are loud enough to damage hearing.
- Tesla hasn't said whether the October 1 event will be live or where it will happen, and the car being shown isn't street legal — expected to cost hundreds of thousands of dollars through a Ferrari-style track program for superfans.
- Reservation holders who put down $50,000 for the standard car or $250,000 for the Founders Series in 2017 are still waiting, with Marques Brownlee and Sam Altman both publicly canceling their orders.
- Electrek argues the Roadster 'stopped being a car program a while ago' and is now 'a commercial for the Tesla-SpaceX relationship, staged with SpaceX hardware,' timed to warm Wall Street ahead of an expected shareholder vote on merging Tesla and SpaceX.
Why it matters: The October 1 event lands as Musk courts investors toward merging Tesla and SpaceX, and Electrek frames the demo as a stock-pump device rather than a product launch. Reservation holders who paid $50,000-$250,000 in 2017 have now waited nine years past the promised 2020 production date, with even high-profile backers like Marques Brownlee and Sam Altman walking away. The substantive question is whether a remote-operated hover demo — not a drivable, street-legal car — moves the needle for either buyers or the merger's shareholders.
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