Elon Musk Announces Tesla Semi-Truck Unveiling In September, Pickup Truck In 2 Years

Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced Thursday on Twitter the electric vehicle manufacturer will unveil its first semi-truck in September. It will be the first non-personal transport vehicle to be launched by the company.

Like Tesla’s other vehicles, the semi-truck will be electric. What battery it will house to power its much bigger frame (compared to the cars the company currently makes), what the top speed would be, how far it would travel on a single charge, and other details are not yet known, but if Musk’s tweet is anything to go by (and at least insofar as Tesla goes, he has a history of delivering), it will be an impressive machine.

However, Musk is not stopping there. He also announced Tesla will unveil a pickup truck “in 18-24 months” from now.

In replying to a question from one of his 8.19 million followers on Twitter, the billionaire entrepreneur also revealed that the upcoming Model 3 sedan will be rolled out in July, a date hundreds of thousands of people who booked the vehicle are anxiously waiting for.

Apart from the commercial vehicles that were announced, Musk disclosed another exciting fact about the Tesla Roadster.

Tesla has been ramping up production to meet the demand for Model 3, and recently launched a bid to raise $1.15 billion to meet some of the associated expenses. Come Sunday, April 16, the company is also phasing out the cheapest car it currently sells, the 60 and 60D variants of its Model S sedan. The production ramp up seems to be chugging along just fine, since Tesla’s January-March quarter saw its highest-ever production and deliveries.

The flow of good news coming out of the company (except a few hiccups, such as Utah disallowing direct sales) has been good for the Tesla share price, which has now surged, making it the most valuable auto manufacturer in the country, ahead of Ford and General Motors. At close of trading Thursday, Tesla stock was at $304 a share on Nasdaq, up 2.41 percent during the day. Its market cap now stands $50.72 billion, ahead of Ford’s 44.04 billion and GM’s 50.05 billion. Both those stocks trade on the New York Stock Exchange, and lost 1.07 percent and 1.62 percent during Thursday trade, respectively.