Tesla

Five years ago, they said that Volkswagen was “the new Nokia.” Today it is the leader in electric vehicles in Europe while Tesla stagnates

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The era of traditional car manufacturers is over. We have to avoid being a new Nokia It was January 2020 and we were not very aware of what was coming our way when Herbert Diess, then CEO of the Volkswagen Group, pointed to another apocalypse. Specifically, that of traditional manufacturers in the face of the emergence of the electric car. Tesla was the reference when the top leader of the German firm spoke about his own company as if it were about to fall into ostracism. Today, six years later, the Volkswagen Group sells one in four electric cars in Europe. Two other companies have already passed Tesla. And a China looms on the horizon. How we have changed. IF you want to understand how much and how the electric car has grown in Europe you just have to take a look at how was the market five years ago. In 2020the best-selling electric car was the Renault Zoe, which reached close to 100,000 units on the market. It was followed by the Tesla Model 3, which was close to 88,000 units and already had a 6% market share. By then, the Tesla Model Y, which would soon become the best-selling electric car in Europe and the world (even including combustion ones), had not yet arrived. Of the 10 best-selling electric vehicles, the Volkswagen Group had three classifieds that barely added up 9% market share. In those days, Tesla seemed like the benchmark. A brand with a single model had managed to sneak into the top 10 best-selling electric cars. The first large mass electric SUV had not arrived. And even the leaders of Volkswagen feared for the future of their own company. The new Nokia. “The era of the classic car manufacturers is over. This is probably the most difficult challenge that Volkswagen has ever faced,” said Herbert Diess in January 2020 in statements reported by Reuters. And he put the finishing touch, if Volkswagen did not advance quickly it would become “the new Nokia.” The company embarked on a launch plan to put electric cars on the market at full speed. Along the way he started a questionable plan in which it was reached develop a single platform for two cars that arrived with enormous delay. And Cariad, which should have been a company of key software development for the brand, was unable to give them software up to par. In the years to come, Tesla ate up much of the European market although its relevance plummeted since last year. In 2022 Its market share among electric vehicles remained at 13%. In 2023 shot up to 18% and in 2024 it remained at 17%. The big fall came with 2025 in which it remained at just 8%. And things aren’t looking better this year. Overcome. In the first quarter of 2026, Tesla appears to have remained somewhat stagnant as more and more companies begin to add electric vehicles to the market. The Tesla Model Y continues to lead sales and the Tesla Model 3 is the third best-selling electric car in Europe. But electric sales have skyrocketed in Europe and Elon Musk’s people are not taking full advantage. In the first quarter of the year, have been sold in the European Union 546,937 electric cars, 32% more than in the same period in 2025. And the market share now almost reaches 20%, some four points above the figures from twelve months ago. In that period, Tesla has increased its overall market share from 1.3% to 2.0% and among electrics it has risen to just above 10%. However, traditional companies are pushing hard. The Volkswagen Group, which has added the arrival of more affordable cars like the Skoda Elroq (among the three best sellers in Europe) and has renewed a large part of the fleet it already had under its own brand sales have skyrocketed. And Stellantis or Hyundai/Kia threaten to overtake Tesla. BYD is also among the best sellers in Europe. Carefully. When taking European sales data, some care must be taken and it is preferable to make readings by quarter. And Tesla continues to have an enormous dependence on registrations in the last month of each quarter. The transition from March to April is a good example of this. And, as we said, in March Tesla marked a 10% market share among electric vehicles but in April there are already records (in the absence of those from ACEA) that lThey leave you at 8.9%. These fluctuations are more than common but they show that Tesla continues to be irregular in its month-to-month growth. The same as almost always. Despite the fluctuations, the truth is that Tesla has not managed to capitalize on the increase in electric sales as expected. Elon Musk himself anticipated global sales of 20 million units impossible things that seem very difficult to achieve, if not impossible. The company has been working to put smaller and more accessible models of the Model Y and Model 3 on the market with which to face the arrival of new launches from traditional brands. That has not happened and along the way they are being eaten up by those companies that were said to be “the new Nokia.” Furthermore, they have to face the arrival of a BYD that has burst in force. The Chinese company is already among the 10 manufacturers that sell the most electric vehicles in Europe and its deployment is in full takeoff ramp. Additionally, their success with plug-in hybrids is helping them raise awareness of the brand. For example (and although their plug-in hybrids are taken into account here), in the first quarter they sold 50,646 units in Europe, compared to 18,782 units in the same period of 2025. Photo | Carter Baran and Aidan Hancock In Xataka | Tesla wanted to make 20 million cars in 2030. The reality in 2025 is that Tesla has crashed and BYD is already leading

After a catastrophic 2025, Tesla sales continue to decline in China. The solution is an old acquaintance

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Sales of electric cars have fallen in China. Although the loss is not as high as that of pure combustion vehicles, the decline in the market is producing very bad results for Tesla. And Elon Musk’s company has brought out one of its traditional tools to boost sales again. An obvious fall. Sales of electric cars in China are not reaping the best results although, everything must be said, recent weeks are beginning to give some hope to companies. At the moment, if global sales are not suffering a setback it is because the accelerator has been put into exportswith record numbers and growth of more than 70% compared to last year. But in the domestic market, sales of “new energy” cars (plug-in hybrids and electric) have fallen 21%reaching 2.92 million cars sold compared to 3.66 million last year. In recent weeks, the Hormuz crisis has served to begin to ground the decline of this type of car. Without state aidits sales had fallen but in recent days we have seen how the savings compared to gasoline have turned the situation around, to the point of break record in plug-in penetrations in the market. Damaged. The context so far this year has not been easy for brands that only sell plug-in vehicles. Much less, therefore, to those who only sell electric vehicles, like Tesla. Without state aid at the beginning of the year and a Chinese New Year longer than usual, sales of this technology fell in a market accustomed to growing year after year. This situation rewarded those who have the most diversified business. In January and FebruaryGeely, which has a portfolio where electric, plug-in hybrids and pure combustion cars are intertwined managed to surpass BYD whose leadership seemed untouchable. Tesla has been through a similar situation. So far this year, Its sales from January to April 2026 have fallen by 15%. It is a bad figure considering all the difficulties the company went through last year. This has led it to lose more market share and remain at just over 3%. Interests. Among the sales of its cars in China, The company has a huge dependence on the Model Ywhich represents around 75% of sales so far this year. But in April, where the Model 3 had a year-on-year drop of 66.09%, the sedan barely accounted for 11% of sales. The fastest solution has been through an old tool: loans. The company has an active campaign in China to defer payments for its cars at 0.99% interest in the case of the Model 3 and 0.92% in the Model Y. The idea is simple, aiming to reward the customer in the long term because it is increasingly difficult for them to compete at the starting price. Right now, in Spain it gives loans above 3% which, however, remains relatively low for our country’s market. However, the company has been offering similar loans before and, right now, In Germany a 0% interest offer is available. Other solutions. Very low interest loans are not Tesla’s only move in China. Aware that the Model 3 has little sales at the moment, GigaShanghai’s exports have skyrocketed so far this year. So much so that global sales, internal sales and those outside Chinese borders, they have grown 36% last April. This means that, clearly, Tesla is trying to move the focus of its target audience. The company has encountered the problem that in China the customer has turned to the local product that usually offers more for less money. The solution is to push the European market, which is now receiving the first units of the Basic Tesla Model 3. less margin. The problem for the company is that it can no longer push the price as hard as before. Before the massive embrace of the Chinese car in its local market and new models began to arrive in the European market, Tesla played as it wanted with demand rising and falling prices. Today those days are over and, what is worse for the company, Your profit margins cannot respond as before. As the price has fallen, the margin has narrowed, losing ability to continue moving in the market. This explains why the voices calling for smaller and more affordable versions of their cars are heard louder. A ship that, given what has been seen, Elon Musk’s company has not been able to bring to fruition. Photo | Priscilla Du Preez and Sou Jest In Xataka | Elon Musk called the $25,000 Tesla an “absurd idea.” Now you need it to compete in China

For the CEO of Ford, the reference for the electric car is no longer Tesla, it is China

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The head of Ford has been studying Chinese manufacturers in depth for months and is clear about one thing: that to understand where the electric car is going, we must pay close attention to China. For some years now the country is leading a historic transition in the automobile, and the perfect proof of this reality is the fixation that brands as historic as Ford have with the Chinese electric car. And for Jim Farley, CEO of the company, Tesla is no longer the benchmark. China, not Tesla. The automobile industry has been at a crossroads for some time. Electric sales are not growing at the expected rate in the West, large manufacturers have had to rethink their strategies and convert their factories (energy storage for data centers), and in the United States the elimination of federal tax incentive It has made the purchase of a new electric car even more expensive. In this context, Ford CEO Jim Farley explained in the Rapid Response podcast that Tesla is no longer the benchmark, and that it is now China. Change of sight. In the interview, Farley explained why he has been testing a Xiaomi SU7 instead of an American vehicle. “If you’re an American and you want us to beat the Chinese in the car business, you’re going to want to pay attention, not necessarily to Tesla. Nothing against Tesla, they’re doing well, but they don’t really have an up-to-date vehicle,” he said. And his reference for Ford is not Elon Musk, but BYD: “The best thing in the business for us in cost, supply chain, manufacturing experience and innovation is BYD,” Farley said. in the same podcast. Concerning. BYD was born in 1995 as a battery manufacturer and today is the largest electric car manufacturer in the world by volume. having surpassed Tesla in global sales in 2025. In 2022 it was the first manufacturer to completely abandon pure gasoline cars. For Farley, what is relevant is not the market capitalization of each company, but rather who is defining what the consumer will want to buy in the next decade. TOGod to the expensive electric ones. Ford has learned its lesson through million-dollar losses. The company became the second brand that sold the most electric cars in the US after Tesla, but its models were, according to Farley himself, “designed in the wrong way.” In December 2025, Ford took over a $19.5 billion correction having to reformulate its entire electric strategy. He F-150 Lightningwhich was presented as the flagship of its electrical commitment, is converted into an EREV vehicle (with a small combustion engine that acts as a generator) because, as admitted Farley himself in December, “the $70,000 electric cars were not selling.” The new roadmap involves launching an electric pickup at $30,000 before 2027. The key is in the second-hand market. Farley has an unconventional way of reading the market. And it is that prefer look at the sales of used cars before those of new ones, because “the second-hand market is twice that of new ones, and since they are all sold at lower prices, they are a better predictor of consumer behavior.” And of course, in this market, affordable electric and hybrid vehicles are the ones that move the most compared to those in the premium segment. China is not just price. Farley recognize that each Chinese car incorporates about 4,000 or 5,000 dollars in government subsidies, direct and indirect. He is also aware that these vehicles incorporate up to ten cameras and advanced connectivity systems that, in his opinion, “should be reviewed by the US Department of Defense for reasons of national security.” However, Farley concludes that the correct response is not to ignore them, but to learn from them. “That is the gift that China has given us: that we are respectful enough of its progress not to settle for business as usual,” he said in the interview. Cover image | Hans and Rapid Response In Xataka | The longest straight road in the world is a mental challenge: 240 km without curves, in the middle of the desert and with truck traffic

buy a new Tesla

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In April 2019 Tesla launched its platform “Hardware 3” (HW3) with an apparently blunt message: all cars leaving the factory would have, thanks to this platform, the necessary hardware for complete autonomous driving. There were many customers who trusted that promise and They spent between 8,000 and 15,000 dollars to enjoy itbut they have just found themselves in a huge bucket of cold water: HW3 is not powerful enough for unattended FSD, Elon Musk has assured. The technical reason. The HW3 bottleneck that Musk alluded to is memory bandwidth: this platform has only one eighth of the memory bandwidth that HW4 has. The FSD system is based on so-called autoregressive transformers and to be able to work with them a specific bandwidth is necessary that cars with HW3 cannot reach. There is no easy way to fix it. You cannot optimize the software or the AI ​​model: it is the chip itself that is physically limited and no OTA update can fix the problem. Elon Musk made it clear in the investor conference after the presentation of quarterly results: “I wish it were different,” he explained, “but Hardware 3 simply does not have the capacity to achieve FSD without supervision.” Millions of vehicles affected. There are an estimated four million Tesla vehicles active and on the road that are based on HW3. Of those, around 285,000 bought the FSD package. Investor Ross Gerber indicated in X that Tesla’s financial liability could amount to several billion dollars. Better buy a new Tesla. The firm has not announced refunds or compensation to those affected. What it does offer are two alternatives. The first, a trade-in (deliver your car and buy a Tesla with HW4) without giving specific financial details. The second, a free update they have called “V14-lite”, which will reach owners of cars with HW3 in June. Theoretically, this version will offer the FSD v14 options adapted to that older hardware. It is an improvement, yes, but not what was promised for users who have been stuck on FSD v12.6 for a long time. Complex modification. Musk too speak They will offer the ability to upgrade the car to replace the HW3, but the cameras will also need to be replaced. “To do this efficiently, we will have to create microfactories in big cities to do it efficiently. Everything is done in the technical service. It is extremely slow and inefficient to do it. I think over time what makes sense for us is to convert all the HW3 cars to HW4, because that is what will allow them to enter the robotaxis fleet and have unsupervised FSD.” Versions for some, versions for others. While these models were progressively left behind in the support of FSD versions, the new models equipped with HW4 have been able to enjoy FSD v13 and FSD v14, the most recent and powerful versions of this driving assistance software. In fact, we were able to test FSD (Supervised) a few days ago, an FSD v14 version of this system. In Europe there are also affected. In Europe there were also users who purchased Tesla’s FSD package even without being able to use it legally on European roads. One of those users, Mischa Sigtermans, is a Dutchman who bought his model 3 in 2019 waiting for FSD’s promise to be fulfilled and paid 6,400 euros for it. Seven years later he finds that the FSD (Supervised) mode has finally been approved in his country, but he cannot use it because his car is HW3. has created a website for Europeans affected by the problem and has received 3,000 registrations, which represents six million euros in FSD purchases. In Xataka | Elon Musk knows that TSMC is overwhelmed: Terafab is his idea to completely change the global chip industry

A bakery accepted an order for 2,000 cakes for Tesla. Elon Musk had to mediate to avoid bankruptcy

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Large companies are not only a pole of job creation or direct wealth for those who work in them, but, indirectly, they are also a driver of indirect development for other companies in the area. Sometimes, they can also be your downfall. In early 2024, a small artisan bakery in San Jose, California, nearly went bankrupt when it tried to fill a huge order for cakes for Tesla’s offices. A last-minute change of heart left the small business on the brink of bankruptcy and in debt. As and how they counted in The Guardian, Elon Musk had to intervene. Laura’s sweet request Voahangy Rasetarinera, owner of the Giving Pies bakery, was challenged to handle an order of 2,000 mini pies for a Tesla employee event. This request represented a great economic opportunity for small businessbut it also represented a significant logistical challenge given its magnitude and the bakery’s limited resources. Rasetarinera consulted his staff and they agreed to accept the order by sending the invoice to Tesla. Delivery dates would be Tuesday and Thursday of the following week. Elon Musk’s company diverted payment for the cakes to a third-party supplier called City Flavor, which did not respond to payment requests after delivering the first round of cakes. “I remained optimistic as I waited for the payment on Thursday. However, when it didn’t materialize, I became concerned.” That same day, Laura, Rasetarinera’s contact at Tesla, called the bakery to apologize for the delay in payment for the first round, citing the inexperience of the suppliers. On that same call, Laura requested to double the cake order. In total, the bill already amounted to $16,000 for 4,000 cupcakes that Giving Pies was to deliver. The bakery was forced to redouble its efforts paying overtime to staff, purchasing more ingredients that he had not yet charged for, and, most importantly, rejecting other orders to meet Tesla’s enormous demand. After consulting with the employees again, everyone agreed to go ahead, so Rasetarinera sent a new expanded invoice to Tesla with the new amount and they got into trouble with the new shipment, but not before sending a message to Laura, to demand payment for the first batch of cakes. “I’m sorry to bother you again, but I’m a small business. I don’t have the luxury of infinite resources, so I really need to get paid to insure my staff,” the businesswoman wrote to Tesla, as published the local media Kron4. Tap on the image to go to the original message However, the joy was short-lived. Just a week before the delivery date, Tesla canceled the order without notice. Just like Rasetarinera explained on the bakery’s Instagram account, “we received an email saying they were canceling the order. There was no explanation. Just a message saying, ‘Hey, I’m so sorry, I don’t think we’re going to need this order anymore.’” Unpaid bills and 2,000 cupcakes in the oven The cancellation of the order had serious consequences for Giving Pies. The pastry shop He had already invested in ingredients, increased his staff and rejected other orders in order to fulfill Tesla’s order. What was shaping up to be a great opportunity to work with a great company had turned into a nightmare of unpaid bills. Rasetarinera explained on his social networks that “we had to buy additional ingredients, hire extra staff and schedule overtime.” All of this represented a considerable expense for a small business. “I had invested time, resources and effort based on Tesla’s guarantees, only to be left in the lurch,” declared the owner to Guardian. The news spread quickly on social networks and local media that echoed the bad trick that Tesla had done to this small merchant, generating outrage among users due to Tesla’s lack of consideration for a local business. The word spread through social networks, even reaching the ears of Elon Musk himself. Elon Musk and the unexpected solution When Elon Musk found out about the situation, he decided to take matters into his own hands. From your X accountMusk apologized for what happened to the bakery and promised to resolve the problem. “I just found out about this. We are fixing it immediately,” the billionaire wrote. Tap on the image to go to the original message Musk’s solution was simple but effective: Tesla would buy all the pies Giving Pies could produce, and he also invited the owner on a tour of the factory. “People should always be able to count on Tesla to do its best,” Elon Musk wrote in his X message. A Tesla representative would later confirm to KGO-TV that there had been a communication problem and that Laura did not have the capacity to authorize payments. For Giving Pies, this experience ended up being positive. Not only did they overcome the financial hardship due to the investment made in the order, but they also gained publicity and support from the community. As shown on your websitetoday, Giving Pies sweetens the holidays for some of Silicon Valley’s biggest tech companies. In Xataka | An Englishman named his restaurant “Tesla.” He was immediately left without a name and with a fine of 14,000 euros thanks to Musk In Xataka | Tesla has been suing buyers and journalists for criticizing its cars in China for some time. And he’s winning Image | DVIDS (Justin Pacheco), Giving Pie A version of this article was published in February 2025

Tesla robotaxis are autonomous, except when driven by a man from Texas

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Taking a trip in an autonomous taxi is an unsettling feeling of a future that is already here. However, even if the driver’s seat is empty, we now know that sometimes there is a person at the controls who is controlling it remotely. It happened recently with Waymo and now we have learned that Tesla does it too. Self-employed, sometimes. They count in Futurism that Tesla has recognized (after being required by the US Senate) that it has human operators who can take complete control of the vehicle in certain situations. These operators are located at the headquarters in Austin, Texas, or Palo Alto, California. Exceptional situations. As explained in the letter sent to the Senate, this is “As a security measure in exceptional cases (…) as a last resort once all other available intervention actions have been exhausted.” When this remote mode is activated, the operator cannot exceed 16 kilometers per hour. For example, it is used if the vehicle is stuck on a road. Why is it important. Self-driving taxi companies like Waymo and, now, Tesla, have gone to great lengths to hide these types of remote interventions because it is a way of admitting that we are far from 100% autonomous driving. At the beginning of the year, Elon Musk boasted that their robotaxis were circulating without a safety monitor, but shortly after we learned that what they had really done was converting that safety monitor into a vehicle with a driver that followed each robotaxi. The Waymo case. The leading robotaxis company in the US was the first to recognize human intervention in driving their cars. It also happened as a result of authorities’ scrutiny of its technology. However, unlike Tesla’s system in which the human takes full control of the vehicle, in Waymo the human intervenes to guide the stuck vehicle, but does not drive it directly. The workers who carry out these interventions do so from the Philippines. Risks and criticisms. Tesla speaks of “exceptional cases”, but refused to give details about the frequency of these interventions, which for the Senate was insufficient since remote driving entails significant risks. If, for example, there is latency in the network, it would cause a delay in the remote driver’s orders and may have consequences. Tesla defends itself by arguing that revealing that information would “reveal highly sensitive trade secrets and confidential business practices” that Tesla needs to maintain its “competitive position in the autonomous vehicle industry.” Image | Xataka In Xataka | The robotaxis did not need a driver, but Waymo has ended up paying delivery drivers to close ajar doors

The problem for the US is not that China is mass-producing a new hypersonic missile. It costs the same as a Tesla

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The most advanced military systems have had something in common: exorbitant prices and limited production, with weapons that can take years to manufacture and cost millions per unit. It happens that there is a less known fact that is beginning to change everything: today it is possible to build technology capable of traveling more than 1,000 kilometers in minutes using components derived from the civil industry. And China is in the lead. What a car costs. It we count in November of last year. China has introduced a quiet but profound change in modern warfare: a hypersonic missile, the YKJ-1000capable of reaching speeds of up to Mach 7 and traveling more than 1,000 kilometers for a price around at $99,000that is, equivalent to that of a high-end car like a Tesla Model It is not a trivial fact, although it may seem anecdotal, it is actually the core of the problem you have right now. United States in Iranbecause it completely breaks the traditional logic of military balance: for the first time, an extremely advanced weapon allows to be exclusive and expensive to become something potentially massive, accessible and replicable on a large scale. It’s not the technology, it’s the cost. Because the challenge for the United States is not that China has developed a new hypersonic missile, but that it has done so extremely cheap. While intercepting a threat can cost millions per attempt (with systems like Patriot, SM-6 or THAAD), destroying that missile costs dozens of times more to manufacture it. This creates a brutal asymmetry where the attacker always wins financially, forcing the defender to spend disproportionate amounts just to stay safe. In this scenario, defending yourself is no longer sustainable, especially in the face of massive attacks. Mass production. Unlike traditional programs, this missile is not a limited or experimental piece, but rather a product designed to be manufactured in large quantities. using civil materialscommercial supply chains and components already available on the market. China has not only reduced the cost, but has industrialized productionallowing us to imagine scenarios where hundreds or thousands of these systems can be rapidly deployed, saturating any existing defense without the need for absolute precision. Invisible launchers. The change is not limited to the missile itself, but how it unfolds– Can be launched from platforms hidden in shipping containers, trucks or common industrial facilities, integrating into global civil infrastructures. This virtually eliminates any predictability on the origin of the attack, expanding the scope of the threat to any point within its operational radius. In other words, war no longer has defined fronts and begins to depend more on a diffuse network where the attacker can appear anywhere without prior notice. The swarm effect. Added to this logic is the parallel development of advanced drones like the TM-300capable of flying at high speed, with stealth capacity and also designed for mass production. In that light, the combination of cheap missiles and swarming drones creates a scenario in which even sophisticated defenses can be overcome. simply by volumenot because of technological superiority. It is not necessary for all attacks to be successful: it is enough for some to do so to generate a disproportionate strategic impact. Change of era. If you like, all this points to a structural transformation: one where the advantage is no longer in having the most advanced weapons, but in being able to produce them faster and cheaper that the opponent can defend himself. The central idea, as we saw in Ukraine and now in Iranis clearly imposed: the problem for the United States is not that China is mass manufacturing a new hypersonic missile, but that it is doing so at a ridiculously low costaltering the balance between attack and defense and opening the door to a war where quantity and price can prevail over technology and sophistication. Image | x In Xataka | China is sending drones to an island 100 km from Taiwan. The problem is that Japan and the US are filling it with missiles In Xataka | China has drawn a very clear red line to Japan: being an ally of the United States is good, supporting Taiwan is bad.

The Tesla Model 3 once again offers a rear-wheel drive version that starts at 35,000 euros

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Tesla needs to sell cars. It seems silly to say this about a brand that obviously sells cars. But Tesla is different because its CEO warned a few days ago that the company was in the process of pivoting. With sales that suffer in all markets for a perfect cocktail created by the Elon Musk’s political movements, the lack of a Tesla Model 2 that expands the range and a product that is not renewedthe market is punishing them harshly. The company also appears to have lost its financial advantage. It wasn’t that long ago that I could play with the price of the car, eat a good chunk of profit margins that were huge and continue to be competitive for pure price. Now, with rivals launching models on the market at a good pace, this game becomes more complicated. What’s left for Tesla? Lower their already minimalist cars to create a pure and simple mobility object. But, above all, try to rely on where they have the best results. The new Tesla Model 3, the rear-wheel drive model, is a good example of this. Why does an electric car have less autonomy than advertised? Tesla Model 3 RWD technical sheet TESLA MODEL 3 RWD Measurements and weight 4,720 mm long, 1,850 mm wide and 1,440 mm high. 2,890 mm wheelbase. 1,772 kg. Trunk 682 liters to the roof of the trunk (Tesla does not specify if it includes the double bottom of the rear trunk). bodywork five-seater sedan Maximum speed Maximum speed of 201 km/h Acceleration (0 to 100 km/h) 6.2 seconds WLTP range 534km WLTP consumption 13.0 kWh/100 km DGT environmental badge Zero emissions. DRIVING AIDS Autopilot system with adaptive cruise control with Stop&Go function, lane keeping, blind spot sensor, emergency braking, front and rear cross traffic control. 360º camera and autonomous parking. Operating system Tesla Software not compatible with Android Auto and Apple CarPlay. Grok AI as a voice assistant. MULTIMEDIA SCREEN 15.8-inch central screen. OTHERS Wireless charging for mobile phone, two USB-C sockets. Specifically developed Spotify, Disney+, Steam, Youtube, Netflix applications. PRICE From 35,000 euros with a brand discount and without government aid The right changes, the usual advantage What changes in the new Tesla Model 3 RWD? Rather little. On the outside the changes are practically imperceptible. They just stop at some black logos (which were already coming in the last deliveries) and some very closed wheels to increase the car’s autonomy. Rims that give a greater feeling of quality than the hubcaps of the Tesla Model Y although they are very similar. Inside, wireless mobile charging is eliminated and the imitation leather seats have been replaced by cloth seats. I am one of those who prefers change, the current ones are good (without being spectacular) and I have the feeling that the fabric is going to age better than the previous seats. Of course, this is still mere intuition. The seat controls for electric control have also disappeared. You have to go to the screen but since you can save your personal profile with your mobile phone, which still acts as a key, it shouldn’t be a problem. And, if you look for them, all the controls are on the screen except for the turn signals, where Tesla collected cable to return the lever behind the steering wheel. Software continues to be the best ally in this case. The menus are clear, simple and it’s easy to remember where what is. The problem as always is having to touch the screen for functions that are better operated by hand. To improve the experience, Tesla has added Grok AI as a voice assistant. In its latest update, this chatbot with artificial intelligence is available in beta phase and that leaves us at the moment with a somewhat strange situation because it continues to coexist with Tesla’s voice assistant. To put it somewhat simply, Grok cannot handle the “material” functions of the car. That is to say. You can’t ask Grok to roll down the window or change the air conditioning. The assistant notifies us that it cannot do this function and tells us how we can ask the Tesla voice assistant for it. It’s a shame because the latter requires more precise orders and less natural language. Grok feels like an almost obligatory update in a car that forgets about physical controls. The promise of a voice assistant with artificial intelligence that learns from what you tell it is almost essential to manage the car’s functions with a much more natural and less robotic language. What we can ask Grok for is a route, change it on the fly or tell him to find places to eat, sleep or buy some clothes while we’re on the go. This does seem useful to me. For example, in our case we asked him to take us on a route to Berlin but to find us a five-star hotel in Paris to stop and rest. In a few seconds we had the route made and the hotel selected. For a practical as well as fun point of view, the assistant can be used with two female voices and two male voices, each with its own name, and different personalities. From the pure assistant to the conspiracy, passing through a “language teacher”, the doctor, the narrator, the therapist and the “meditation” mode. The information provided with each of them is different and adjusts to their personalities, so if we want more truthful information we should go to the assistant. However, you have to be careful because Grok pointed out to me, for example, that you can only enter the city of Madrid if you have a Zero Emissions sticker, which is not true. Of course, the fact that it lacks restrictions can be funny, like when she told us that an electric car “will never equal a gasoline car”, that her favorite car was a Porsche 911 Carrera RS 2.7 or that she totally disagreed with Elon Musk’s … Read more

RAM is in an “unprecedented” crisis. So much so that even Tesla is considering opening its own memory factory

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Neither technological advances nor a revolution in devices: crises are what is defining the last years of the sector. He veto Huaweithe semiconductor crisis of 2020 and now, the RAM memory crisis. The difference between this crisis and the previous one is that, although the 2020 crisis was caused by a perfect storm, the RAM memory crisis is being caused by excessive interest in data centers and AI. And it is taking all sectors ahead. That there is no RAM memory for consumers is a symptom, but it implies something much bigger: although the main producers are investing millions to increase your RAM productionit is not memory for consumption, but for GPUs and data center systems. Only a few companies dominate the production of these chips, and if they cannot produce them, they do not produce the memory chips for SSDs –raising the price-. They dedicate all production to meeting the demands of AI. And, as we read in FortuneElon Musk, one of the owners of some of the largest data centers on the planethas shown that there are two ways to face this crisis: hitting the wall or taking action. And the translation is that Tesla is considering building its own RAM factory. The problem is that it is easier said than done. Tesla and Intel interested in biting the RAM biggies In recent weeks, some of the world’s leading companies have presented results and RAM has been the central topic. PlayStation, for example, has assured that they are very aware of their ability to continue manufacturing PS5 with the goal of not going upagain, the price. And NVIDIA has been stating for days that it needs TSMC – its main chip supplier – and Samsung – who provides them with new generation HBM4 memory – get the batteries. Meanwhile, the outlook is not good. own NVIDIA aims for seven or eight years of construction no brake on data centers. Intel assures that The crisis will extend beyond 2028 and Micron, one of the big three in DRAM memory, has cataloged the market bottleneck as “unprecedented.” In this technological tsunami, and during Tesla’s results presentation at the end of January, Elon Musk pointed out that the company could need to build your own memory manufacturing plant. The objective is the one that all companies have: ensure supply. Going from scratch to manufacturing RAM memory is easier said than done, however, here Tesla has an advantage: they are not new to chip manufacturing. Although they abandoned the project for a few months, at the beginning of this year Musk himself stated that They came back with their own chip for your data centers. Additionally, there is the fact that they are a company with enough muscle to create a clean chip manufacturing room next to some of its existing plants. Intel is another one looking to become one of the important voices in the RAM conversation. Together with the Japanese giant SoftBank, they are developing an evolution of stacked DRAM memory that have been baptized as ‘ZAM’ and that seeks to break the HBM memory monopoly of Samsung, Micron and SK Hynix. Now, things in the palace are going slowly, and if Intel (which is already in it) It will take between three and four years to have commercial productsTesla’s ambition may go into the next decade. Let’s hope we don’t continue in this crisis by then, but if more “players” are interested in producing RAM, it would mean that, in the event of subsequent crises, there will not be a few that dominate the sector, producing a bottleneck like the one we are experiencing. Domino effect of the AMR crisis and China taking action Because this is not just about RAM being more expensive for users: it goes much further. If companies do not have the capacity to satisfy the demand for AI, they pour all their manufacturing muscle into a single task, neglecting the others. This explains the rise in the price of SSDs, but also of other products that should not have a leading role in this conversation: hard drives or HDDs. It is a brutal domino effect because, as we say, it goes beyond the modules being more expensive: RAM is more expensive for companies and that implies mobile phones or more expensive or with less RAMconsoles that increase in price (like what is happening posing for nintendo switch 2), machines that are late and they will be more expensive (like the Steam Machine), car problems and even impacting the routers. And in this scenario, in which companies like Intel or Tesla are considering taking a bite out of the RAM sector, we have some Chinese companies that had no role in the conversation. positioning itself as an option to alleviate demand. We told it a few days ago: there were reports indicating that PC brands such as Asus, Dell or HP were considering purchasing memory from Chinese manufacturers such as CXMT. Their modules are not as advanced as those of Samsung, for example, and they do not have the production capacity of South Korean companies, but… they produce. And in lean times, that’s better than selling laptops without RAM. Anyway, as we have said on occasion, there are still more companies joining the production of RAM when the crisis has already had a full impact, but the goal is not to create more RAM for ourselvesbut for your data centers. It’s time to entrust ourselves to the most sacred thing: that our PC doesn’t break and we need to update. Images | Gage Skidmore, Intel In Xataka | The US has a problem with its AI data centers: more and more states are opposed to building them

Tesla popularized “invisible” car door handles. China has just handed down its death sentence

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In China they have been wanting for a long time ban retractable handles of the vehicles, a design commonly popularized by Tesla. It is no wonder, since over the last few years we have witnessed serious fatal and safety incidents involving this type of handles. The regulations will force many of the best-selling models on the market to be redesigned. what has happened. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology of China has approved a new safety regulation that will come into force on January 1, 2027. The regulation prohibits door handles recessed in the body and requires that all vehicles have visible handles and a mechanical opening system on each door, according to they count from Financial Times. Why is it important. The hidden handle design has become popular in recent years in electric cars. In China they had been following Tesla’s example for a long time, looking for a more minimalist aesthetic and small aerodynamic improvements. Virtually all of the major electric car manufacturers in China have models with retractable handles. However, these designs have proven to be dangerous in emergency situations. The trigger. A fatal accident in 2024 with Aito’s M7 SUV was one of the main triggers. Three people, including a two-year-old child, died after a crash. Videos shared on social media showed rescue teams breaking windows to try to save victims. As Aito explained in a statement, “the power and signal cables were immediately cut, preventing the handle controller from receiving the ejection signal.” The concern continued after two accidents with the Xiaomi SU7whose videos showed people struggling to open the vehicle doors to rescue those inside, without luck. What the regulations require. Just like they explain from CarNewsChina, the ‘GB 48001-2026’ standard states that each door must have a mechanical exterior handle located in specific areas of the door surface, with sufficient space for manual operation in emergencies such as deployment of restraint systems or battery problems. Electric handles must include independent mechanical mechanisms capable of withstanding forces of at least 500 N. On the other hand, inside, each side door must have at least one mechanical opening handle with graphic symbols of at least 100 mm × 70 mm and clearly visible instructions or pictographic symbols. Impact on the industry. The regulations will affect numerous models from manufacturers such as Xiaomi, BYD and others that have adopted designs similar to Tesla. Bill Russo, founder of Automobility, counted to FT that the standard will require changes to some models but not a complete redesign. “Many manufacturers already design alternative handle solutions for export markets with different regulations,” he explains. “With the new regulation, we will be ready to change any handle as the government wants,” Stella Li, executive vice president of BYD, told Bloomberg TV. Outside China. Perhaps the most notorious case is in the United States, where the issue of hidden handles is also being investigated. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration opened investigations on Tesla Model Y and Model 3 over concerns about the accessibility of their vehicles in emergencies. A particularly serious accident in California that caused the death of three teenagers in a Cybertruckwhere neither the occupants nor anyone close to the incident could open the doors through the hidden handles and reinforced glass, prompted Congress to take action and Tesla to announce a redesign of its handles. Cover image | Eyosias G In Xataka | Putting solar panels on an electric car sounds like a total win-win: the reality of extra autonomy is a bucket of cold water

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