Elon Musk determined to inexperienced gentle the Cybertruck as a result of Ford vehicles had been “boring,” Walter Isaacson mentioned.
The biographer mentioned Musk got here up with the thought six years in the past and was impressed by science fiction.
Musk tweeted on Monday that Ford’s new EV truck was a “good car, simply considerably costly.”
Elon Musk apparently is not a fan of Ford’s conventional pickup vehicles and his distaste for the autos spawned the Cybertruck, in keeping with the billionaire’s biographer, Walter Isaacson.
The creator, who has been shadowing Musk for about three years, mentioned throughout an interview with CNBC’s Squawk Field that the Tesla CEO got here up with the thought for the futuristic electrical pickup truck about six years in the past.
“He is sitting there along with his design chief Franz von Holzhausen and taking a look at a Ford truck and he mentioned, ‘No, this stuff are boring,'” Isaacson mentioned concerning the trade, which he mentioned shall be totally detailed in his upcoming e book.
“He would not prefer to be bored and he places up issues from motion pictures, from sci-fi, from video video games and says, ‘I would like it like that,'” Isaacson added. “And all people’s pushing again on him at this assembly. He lastly says, ‘Yeah, cease it. We’re gonna do it. We’re gonna make it edgy.'”
On Twitter, Isaacson later shared a photograph of Musk and the Tesla design chief in entrance of a sequence of images of what seem like early design concepts for the Cybertruck. The biographer shared a quote from his e book within the tweet, saying that Musk issued an edict in 2017 that the pickup truck can be completely chrome steel.
“The usage of chrome steel opened up new potentialities for the look of the truck,” Isaacson writes. “As an alternative of utilizing stamping machines that may sculpt carbon fiber into physique panels with refined curves and shapes, chrome steel would favor straight planes and sharp angles. That allowed— and in some methods compelled— the design workforce to discover concepts that had been extra futuristic, edgier, even jarring.”
Final week, Tesla shared that the corporate had made its first manufacturing Cybertruck at its Texas Gigafactory. Musk first unveiled the idea for the electrical pickup truck about 4 years in the past and the mission has confronted a sequence of delays over the previous two years.
The Tesla CEO additionally commented on Ford’s competing product — the all-electric F-150 Lightning pickup truck — on Monday after the corporate lowered its costs for the car.
“The Ford Lightning is an efficient car, simply considerably costly, particularly given the excessive rates of interest as of late for any form of mortgage,” Musk tweeted.
Musk is not the one one to touch upon the approaching rivalry between the 2 autos. Final month, Ford CEO Jim Farley appeared to take a dig on the Cybertruck, dubbing it a car “for Silicon Valley individuals” throughout an interview with CNBC’s Jim Cramer.
“The fact is, America loves an underdog — and we’re the market chief for EV vehicles and vans, and we all know these prospects higher than anybody,” Farley mentioned.
The Cybertruck shall be Tesla’s first electrical pickup truck. Up till just lately, Ford has been one in all few automakers to supply an EV pickup truck. Final 12 months, Ford mentioned it delivered over 13,000 electrical F-150 vehicles as the corporate labored to ramp up manufacturing and fulfill about 200,000 reservations. The EV pickup truck startup Rivian additionally has a bounce in the marketplace. Rivian has delivered simply over 29,000 electrical autos since 2021 and final 12 months the corporate mentioned it had a waitlist of over 114,000 pre-orders. Tesla has the vast majority of the general EV market within the US, however the marketplace for pickup vehicles is one of the profitable within the nation.
Musk has mentioned the carmaker plans to start out delivering the Cybertruck inside the 12 months, however the firm has but to launch pricing for the car.
Do you personal an electrical automobile or have perception to share? Attain out to the reporter from a non-work e-mail at gkay@insider.com