Tesla’s Fourth ‘Master Plan’: A Disjointed Assembly of Concepts

Tesla has unveiled its fourth “Master Plan,” which aims to secure its position as a leader in the global adoption of humanoid robots and sustainable energy solutions.

However, the document is notably devoid of crucial details.

Even CEO Elon Musk recognizes this. In one of his rare remarks regarding the plan since its Monday release—among a cascade of discussions on transphobia and immigration—he admitted that the lack of specifics was a legitimate critique and stated that the company would share more information soon.

Who can predict when that will happen? Currently, unlike earlier master plan iterations, this one appears ambiguous, generic, and seems to be a mix of Musk’s usual rhetoric and inputs from the “Abundance bros” fed into ChatGPT and put out for publication. (If generated by Grok, it’s among the most benign outputs that AI chatbot has ever produced.)

The post is populated with sentences reminiscent of a child impersonating a college student, such as: “The hallmark of meritocracy is creating opportunities that enable each person to use their skills to accomplish whatever they imagine.”

Why the vagueness? Perhaps it’s because Tesla has yet to complete all its objectives outlined in the second master plan from 2016 or the third one from 2023.

That second plan aimed for ambitious goals yet was clear in its targets. Musk specified that Tesla would “create a smoothly integrated and beautiful solar-roof-with-battery product that just works” and “scale that throughout the world.” While Tesla has launched a solar roof product, it has faced significant challenges, undergone several redesigns, and has not achieved substantial scale in the U.S., let alone globally.

(Musk leveraged this segment of Master Plan 2 to justify Tesla’s acquisition offer for SolarCity, a struggling company led by his cousins. Tesla spent years defending this acquisition in court and ultimately prevailed.)

In terms of vehicles, Musk committed in Plan 2 to launching a compact SUV, semi-truck, pickup, and an electric bus. Tesla successfully introduced the Model Y, which has become quite popular. However, the Tesla Semi is still under development, the Cybertruck has not met its sales targets, and the company has not yet entered bus production.

The last two components of the second Master Plan aimed to achieve full autonomy for Teslas through a software upgrade and allow owners to contribute their vehicles to a vast, shared network. Neither objective has been realized.

Tesla is testing a limited, invitation-only robotaxi service in Austin, Texas, but all vehicles are equipped with safety monitors in the front passenger seat. Additionally, Tesla has gone through multiple hardware iterations in the last nine years that, by Musk’s own acknowledgment, likely means many cars already on the road do not, as promised, have the necessary technology for full autonomy. (Both the first and second Master Plans have been removed from Tesla’s website as part of a broader cleanup effort.)

Master Plan 3 focused on using Tesla as a beacon to illustrate the feasibility of a sustainable economy. Again, an ambitious aim! But Tesla backed it with considerable specifics, including a 41-page white paper supporting its projections. So far, neither the company nor the world has achieved much from the outlined goals. Meanwhile, Musk invested $300 million to help elect a president who actively opposes the transition to cleaner, more affordable, sustainable energy.

In recent times, Musk has tried to reshape Tesla’s identity. He constantly asserts that it is not just a car manufacturer, but also an AI and robotics enterprise. While there is some truth to this assertion, it does not alter the reality that the majority of the company’s revenue is still derived from the increasingly challenging business of manufacturing and selling electric vehicles.

The belief that Tesla will complete this shift heavily influences its stock price, making it advantageous for the company to embrace this narrative. As a result, Master Plan 4 is highly aspirational.

However, Tesla has typically substantiated its ambitions with measurable goals and benchmarks. This time, Musk has not rigorously made the case for this latest plan. He drafted the first two plans and dedicated four hours on stage with other executives discussing the intricate details of the more comprehensive third version.

In this instance, Tesla’s “Master Plan” was released on a federal holiday, while its CEO spent the day inciting concern over marginalized communities.