DOES THE TESLA CYBERTRUCK EVEN MATTER ANYMORE?

The whole attitude around the Tesla Cybertruck seems to have transitioned from wild shock value and hype, to fan fantasy (Cyber-house, anyone?), to impatience, to skepticism. Will Tesla even get around to making a Cybertruck? Will it matter by the time that they do?

Some might wonder why Tesla doesn’t just cancel the Cybertruck altogether though, especially with the given rivals that have beaten it to the market already. It was supposed to be here by 2021, after all. It would have been the first electric “truck” to market. Since that original timeline has came and went, Rivian has managed to begin production of the R1T, General Motors has launched the GMC Hummer EV, and the Ford F-150 Lighting will begin production this spring. By 2024, Chevrolet will have the Silverado EV on the market, and Stellantis will have the Ram Revolution electric truck.

Making things more obscure is the fact that Tesla was expected to give more definitive guidance during the company’s Q4 earnings call, and didn’t. Instead, Musk focused on AI and FSD technology, and its potential to unlock further value in Tesla vehicles as a means to generate income. Suppose that’s a big deal, but so are the hundreds of thousands of Cybertruck pre-orders in queue.

Perhaps, at the end of the day, the Tesla Cybertruck already did its job without even getting to market. It set the rest of the auto industry in a scramble to respond with electric trucks of their own. If not for the Cybertruck, we may not have, in its wake, the influx of inbound statement making electric trucks we do now. And some of those entries are strong enough for Tesla to completely reevaluate its content strategy for the Cybertruck.

Whether or not it turns out to be a punk out remains to be seen. But with Tesla engineers openly testing Cybertruck prototypes under the eyes of snoopy drone cameras, The Cult of Elon may see their prophecy fulfilled. One day.