Tesla Archives

Self-driving cars are here, but Australian law isn’t ready for them. Here are 3 ways to fix it

The Conversation - November 10, 2025 4 MIN READ

In September, US electric car maker Tesla rolled out a semi-autonomous driving feature it describes as “the future of transport” in Australia. As its name suggests, the Full Self-Driving (Supervised) system blurs the line between human and machine control. Our current licensing and road-safety frameworks were not designed to handle this situation. A federal government… Read more »

Business

Tesla’s self-driving mode is coming to Australia (but not really)

Hussein Dia - September 16, 2025 4 MIN READ

Tesla is expected to soon turn on its “Full Self-Driving (Supervised)” (FSD) mode in Australia and New Zealand. Is a future of driverless cars upon us? Not exactly – it’s essentially more advanced driver assistance. Legally, Tesla drivers using this mode must be ready to take control and pay attention at all times. Calling it… Read more »

Business

Hybrids are the new EVs as Tesla sales plunge 60%

Simon Thomsen - May 26, 2025 3 MIN READ

Sales of new battery electric vehicles (BEVs) in the first quarter of 2025 have fallen to 2023 levels, while demand for hybrid cars as nearly doubled over the past two years. New figures from the peak motoring body Australia Automobile Association’s (AAA) quarterly EV Index reveal 17,914 BEVs were sold in the three months to… Read more »

Global tech

Tesla chair Robyn Denholm denies the car manufacturer is hunting for a new CEO – just after selling $50m in stock

Simon Thomsen - May 1, 2025 4 MIN READ

Robyn Denholm was on stage Blackbird’s Sunrise when the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) published news that Tesla, the company she’s chaired since 2018, was on the hunt for a new CEO. The basketball-loving-and-owning Australian, a Blackbird director, was talking to Sydney Kings and Boomers coach Brian Goorjian about the lessons from sport for leadership and… Read more »

Business

Elon Musk promises less DOGE, more Tesla as profits and revenue go over a cliff

Tom Williams - April 24, 2025 3 MIN READ

Elon Musk says he will “significantly” reduce his work advising the United States government in May to allocate “far more” of his time to Tesla, following the company’s 71% drop in quarterly profits. “The large slug of work” establishing the so-called US Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) for US President Donald Trump had been mostly… Read more »

Business

Sinking in: Tesla EV sales are tanking in Australia

Simon Thomsen - March 10, 2025 3 MIN READ

While the Tesla CEO is busy rage-tweeting, Roman saluting, dialling into far-right German political rallies, cutting aid funding and sacking US government workers, sales of his car brand in Australia, as well as the rest of the world have gone over a cliff, with January’s poor results continuing in February. The plunge for Nasdaq-listed EV… Read more »

Business

Elon Musk has another problem in Australia – a class action over ‘defective’ Tesla cars

Simon Thomsen - February 26, 2025 2 MIN READ

Elon Musk as a long history of big promises and delivery that’s slightly more modest. Even scrutiny of his role in the Trump administration, at a time when Tesla’s share price and sales are plummeting, has revealed that supposed savings in the cuts made by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency are far smaller that… Read more »

Global tech

A billionaire who spent 10 years predicting things his companies still haven’t achieved gets triggered by tech prophecy

Simon Thomsen - January 6, 2025 3 MIN READ

In October last year, the world’s richest conspiracy theorist, Elon Musk, announced plans for a robotaxi, the Tesla Cybercab. Production would begin he said “in 2026”, before correcting himself to “before 2027”, because “I tend to be a little optimistic with timeframes”. That observation is an understatement inversely proportional to Musk’s wealth. So it wasn’t… Read more »

Other

The electric vehicle revolution is a chance for Australia to revive its car industry

Timothy Minchin - April 19, 2023 4 MIN READ

Electric vehicle sales are surging. Australian sales doubled in 2022 to 3.8% of all new vehicle purchases, and were up 780% in the first two months of 2023 compared to a year ago. In the United States, Europe and China, the market share of electric vehicles is much higher, helped by greater government support. As… Read more »

Global tech

A decade after Elon Musk first began hyping self-driving vehicles, here’s why we still don’t have them yet

Neil Sipe - March 24, 2023 4 MIN READ

According to predictions made nearly a decade ago, we should be riding around in self-driving vehicles today. It’s now clear the autonomous vehicle revolution was overhyped. Proponents woefully underestimated the technological challenges. It turns out developing a truly driverless vehicle is hard. The other factor driving the hype was the amount of money being invested… Read more »

Global tech

Why it might be time for Elon Musk to step down as Tesla boss

Peter Wells - January 12, 2023 4 MIN READ

If share price is anything to go by, Tesla is in trouble. The market capitalisation of the electric vehicle (EV) company has fallen by 73% from its record high in November 2021, causing concern for investors. On the face of it, there is no crisis. The cars are still the benchmark for performance. The underlying… Read more »

Global tech

Tesla just had its 3rd vehicle recall in a month – and this time 15,900 cars are involved

Simon Thomsen - November 25, 2022 2 MIN READ

‘Chief Twit’ Elon Musk’s electric vehicle company, Tesla, has copped its third vehicle recall in Australia in less than a month from safety regulators, with the latest software glitch involving around 15,900 Model 3 and Model Y cars imported this year. “Due to a software error, the tail lamps on one or both sides may… Read more »

Business

Ex Tesla Australia boss pleads guilty to insider trading

Simon Thomsen - November 16, 2022 < 1 MIN READ

A former Tesla Motors Australia director, Kurt Schlosser, has pleaded guilty in Sydney’s Downing Centre Local Court to two counts of insider trading over his purchase of shares in a lithium miner. Schlosser acquired 86,478 shares in US-based, ASX-listed Piedmont Lithium Ltd on September 16, 2020, after he find out, in his role as country… Read more »

Other tech

Tesla’s Optimus robot is pretty meh, but Elon Musk’s knack for publicity does advance the promise of bigger and better things

Wafa Johal - October 4, 2022 3 MIN READ

In August 2021, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced the electric car manufacturer was planning to get into the robot business. In a presentation accompanied by a human dressed as a robot, Musk said work was beginning on a “friendly” humanoid robot to “navigate through a world built for humans and eliminate dangerous, repetitive and boring… Read more »

Other tech

Now that Australia’s had a serious accident involving a self-driving car, it’s time to open AI’s black box and decide who’s responsible

The Conversation - May 25, 2022 4 MIN READ

The first serious accident involving a self-driving car in Australia occurred in March this year. A pedestrian suffered life-threatening injuries when hit by a Tesla Model 3 in “autopilot” mode. In the US, the highway safety regulator is investigating a series of accidents where Teslas on autopilot crashed into first-responder vehicles with flashing lights… Read more »