{"id":50431,"date":"2023-05-24T09:03:41","date_gmt":"2023-05-24T13:03:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=50431"},"modified":"2023-05-24T09:03:41","modified_gmt":"2023-05-24T13:03:41","slug":"can-tesla-semi-complete-established-truck-producers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=50431","title":{"rendered":"Can Tesla Semi Compete With Established Automakers?"},"content":{"rendered":"

This article comes to us courtesy of\u00a0EVANNEX<\/a>, which makes and sells aftermarket Tesla accessories. The opinions expressed therein are not necessarily our own at\u00a0InsideEVs<\/a>, nor have we been paid by\u00a0EVANNEX\u00a0to publish these articles. We find the company’s perspective as an aftermarket supplier of Tesla accessories interesting and are happy to share its content free of charge. Enjoy!<\/em><\/p>\n

Posted on<\/span>\u00a0EVANNEX on May 22, 2023,\u00a0by<\/span>\u00a0Charles Morris<\/p>\n

Heavy-duty electric trucks are hitting the highways. After years of conducting pilots, fleet operators are starting to place substantial orders, and both long-established OEMs and startups alike are ramping up production.<\/p>\n

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Above: A Tesla service center (Image: Casey Murphy \/\u00a0EVANNEX<\/a>).<\/em><\/p>\n

During a recent conversation with Rustam Kocher, once Charging Infrastructure Lead at Daimler Trucks North America and now a consultant (watch for the full interview in the next print issue of\u00a0Charged<\/em>), I asked which truck manufacturers he thinks are the most likely to lead in the electric brave new world.<\/p>\n

Kocher praised\u00a0Volvo Trucks<\/a>,\u00a0Freightliner<\/a>\u00a0(a U.S. subsidiary of Daimler), and, in the European market,\u00a0Daimler Truck<\/a>\u00a0and the\u00a0Traton Group<\/a>\u00a0(a subsidiary of Volkswagen). He also favorably mentioned newer entrants such as\u00a0Motiv<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Proterra<\/a>.<\/p>\n

However, it\u2019s another newcomer to the heavy-duty vehicle market that really stands out. \u201cTesla<\/a>, obviously, they\u2019ve got a great product,\u201d said Rustam. \u201cWe talk about gen two, gen three with the OEMs right now, and maybe PACCAR and Navistar are on gen one, gen two. Tesla is on gen five because they built that truck from the ground up to be electric, which none of the major OEMs have yet. They\u2019ll get there, but honestly\u00a0Tesla<\/a>\u00a0is that many more jumps ahead.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kocher sees Tesla<\/a>\u2019s shift to LFP battery chemistries as a positive development for the whole industry. \u201cYou\u2019re already seeing LFP batteries on the Tesla Semi, which is interesting. Now they think maybe they don\u2019t need a 500-mile range, maybe they can get by with 300. Well, that helps the OEMs out there that can just barely reach 300. There\u2019s a lot of use cases for 300-mile trucks out there, so let\u2019s do that with LFP batteries. Iron phosphate batteries are great because they\u2019re durable, they\u2019re cheap. They\u2019re a little heavy and they\u2019re not quite as energy-dense as some of the other chemistries, but they\u2019re a good fit for commercial use.\u201d<\/p>\n

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However, technical superiority alone may not translate to market leadership. An unfortunate truism in the commercial EV space is that fleet operators tend to insist on years-long pilots before they commit to going electric at scale. Vehicle OEMs have likewise tended to take their time developing new models, but regulation may soon force them to shorten their timeframes, and this could favor established brands.<\/p>\n

Rustam Kocher told me that the electric truck product cycle will be \u201cartificially constricted\u201d by the\u00a0Advanced Clean Transportation<\/a>\u00a0regulations. Fleet operators \u201cwon\u2019t have any choice, so they\u2019ll choose OEMs that they trust and move forward. Whether that\u2019s Volvo, Freightliner, PACCAR or Navistar, they have relationships with those OEMs and so they\u2019re going to trust them to build a vehicle that will perform under the conditions that they need it to perform. Tesla\u2019s going to have trouble breaking into the market.\u201d<\/p>\n

Will Tesla be able to earn the respect that established OEMs have built over decades? \u201cWhether or not they can keep their truck intact, maintain it and build the trust within the industry is a good question,\u201d Rustam told me. \u201cI hope they can. I’ve never worked with smarter people. I’ve never worked with a more agile company than when I was working with\u00a0Tesla<\/a>\u00a0on the Megawatt Charging System.\u201d<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared in\u00a0Charged<\/a>. Author:\u00a0Charles Morris<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

===<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This article comes to us courtesy of\u00a0EVANNEX, which makes and sells aftermarket Tesla accessories. The opinions expressed therein are not necessarily our own at\u00a0InsideEVs, nor have we been paid by\u00a0EVANNEX\u00a0to publish these articles. We find the company’s perspective as an aftermarket supplier of Tesla accessories interesting and are happy to share its content free of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8313,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-50431","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-e-cars"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50431","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=50431"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50431\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8313"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=50431"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=50431"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=50431"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}