The Tesla Roadster Returns, And Musk Says It Will Be The 'Most Mind-blowing Product Of All Time'
On Tuesday, Tesla CEO Elon Musk revealed on social media platform X that Tesla will launch its next-generation electric sports car Roadster next year.
The Roadster, a pure electric sports car that the company introduced in 2008 and discontinued in 2012, was Tesla's first mass-produced model. Before its discontinuation, Tesla sold about 2,450 Roadster vehicles in over 30 countries.
Tonight, we radically increased the design goals for the new Tesla Roadster, Musk wrote on Wednesday night. There will never be another car like this, if you could even call it a car.
He added that the new Roadster's mass production design would be completed and announced by the end of this year, with sales set to commence next year.
Most mind-blowing product demo of all time, Musk said.
Tesla announced at the end of 2017 that it will launch a new-generation Roadster. The promotion point of the model at the time was that it could accelerate to 60 mph in 1.9 seconds, with a top speed of 250 mph and a range of 620 miles.
This is impressive, but in a response post to a user's question on X, Musk said on Wednesday that the new Roadster will be able to accelerate to 60 mph in 1 second, and that's just the least impressive part.
The new Roadster was initially scheduled to be rolled out at the end of 2020. In 2021, Musk cited a global supply chain bottleneck and delayed the release of the new Roadster to 2023. However, by 2023, Musk announced that Tesla hopes to begin production of the much-delayed next-generation Roadster in 2024.
However, considering Tesla's repeated delays in the release of the Roadster, it remains an open question whether this electric sports car will be launched successfully next year.
Notably, senior tech journalist Ashlee Vance mockingly asked in the comments section of Musk's post, will the new Roadster end up disappearing like the Apple car?