Tesla is “to keep blowing our minds” with new technology despite Elon Musk's Twitter distraction, said an executive who led Chinese tech giant Tencent's investment in the manufacturer. Tesla has a huge potential, which ensures its support by Tencent.
China's Tencent, one of the world's largest gaming and social media companies, invested in Tesla in 2017 because it saw its great potential. In addition, the company had a lot of respect for the way Elon Musk manages Tesla. Tencent received a 5% stake worth about $1.78 billion.
“We saw a huge potential in the company, the category of EVs but also a huge amount of respect for the way Elon was driving the company,” David Wallerstein, chief “eXploration” officer (CXO) at Tencent, told CNBC in an interview on Thursday.
In his position, he had to invest in new technologies for Tencent, and the choice fell on Tesla. During those times, the manufacturer had a hard time and “it wasn't so clear that they were going to survive and that EVs were going to actually survive,” Wallerstein said. Clearly, Tesla lived up to expectations, as it has since become the world's most valuable car company and the world's largest electric vehicle manufacturer.
In October 2022, Musk completed the purchase of Twitter, which caused jealousy and anxiety among some Tesla investors. They found this to be a big distraction and demanded that all of his attention be directed to the company they were investing in. Even though Musk began to improve Twitter and take steps to save the company from bankruptcy, he continued to have his main focus on Tesla.
Wallerstein said that despite Musk's distraction to his other companies, he still trusts Tesla. “Certainly, if a leader is get distracted across many companies it’s hard to focus and Elon has a lot of projects. I think they're still doing great work,” he said.
Wallerstein is aware that Tesla will have some worthy competitors but believes that they will “be really good for the planet” as electric car sales rise. He is also confident that the company will continue to surprise with its technology. “I would count on them [Tesla] to keep blowing our minds with what they do with technology,” Wallerstein said.
© 2023, Eva Fox | Tesmanian. All rights reserved.
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About the Author
Eva Fox
Eva Fox joined Tesmanian in 2019 to cover breaking news as an automotive journalist. The main topics that she covers are clean energy and electric vehicles. As a journalist, Eva is specialized in Tesla and topics related to the work and development of the company.
