Yesterday evening was special for Tesla as a company, but two people at the Signature Edition Model S and X Delivery Event had the most memories of all.
Elon Musk became the CEO of Tesla in 2008. This was the year of the great economic disaster. However, Musk took the helm at the company at this difficult moment, and today, after almost 18 years, he’s proud to lead Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) to a 1.3 trillion-dollar market cap.
The other person who was with Musk from Day 1 was Tesla’s Chief Designer, Franz von Holzhausen. Since then, Franz’s car design philosophy reflects in every Tesla ever made.
In his opening remarks, Franz summarized his design journey at Tesla in a few lines. He said:
Hey everyone, I am Franz.
Welcome to Fremont, end-of-line. That’s kind of, you know, bittersweet in a way.
I started my journey at Tesla 18 years ago. And day one, we began Model S. And fast-forward to standing on the same bamboo floor 14 years ago to hand over the very first deliveries.
We’re about to do the same thing for the very last deliveries.
You know, basically handing off something great, making way for something greater. But we, you know, wanted to talk a little bit about our journey, and who better to do that than Elon?
Here’s the transcript of Elon Musk’s opening comments as he recapped the Model S history:
This is a, obviously a bittersweet moment, where we’re handing over the last of the Model S and Model X vehicles that we’ve produced, and these vehicles really are what made Tesla into a great car company, and profoundly changed what people’s perception of an electric car was.
I mean, people used to think, electric cars were slow, low range, uh, undesirable, really kind of like golf carts.
Yeah, yeah. Glorified golf carts that were not fun, didn’t look good, and it was like wearing a hair shirt basically.
Franz: You kind of had to give up a little bit of your soul to be in an environmentally friendly vehicle, you know.
Elon: Yeah. So, really, the profound thing that the Model S, especially, showed was that an electric car could actually be the best car of any kind, period.
It was breaking the perception that electric cars are worse than other cars, and showing that actually, if you design it right, with the incredibly talented Tesla team, that you can actually make an electric car be better than any gasoline car.
And, as a result, Model S won not just a Motor Trend Car of the Year, but I think, best car ever, I think [2019 Ultimate Car of the Year Award].
Yeah, and then we followed that up with the Model X, which was, I call it the Fabergé egg of cars. It was something of an exercise in hubris, frankly, but an incredible vehicle with so many small special things about the Model X that most probably most people who buy the car don’t even realize exist.
I’ll tell you something like why, maybe at a fundamental level, why the Model S and X succeeded, which is that those cars were designed with love. Absolutely, they really were every part of it, inside and outside, every detail, even things people couldn’t see. Probably most people would not even experience or often not know existed, we put there because we love the product.
I think that’s at the heart of any great product. If people making it, genuinely love that product, just like you know when you genuinely love your kids, you care about things in a different way.
Automotive Firsts
With the launch of the Model S luxury electric sedan and later the Model X luxury SUV, Tesla introduced several new technologies, systems, and fundamentals to the automotive industry.
Tesla was the pioneer of integrating the battery pack into the car’s floor, starting with the Model S. This not only made the design of an electric car look similar to a conventional vehicle but also provided structural rigidity and a low center of gravity (great for handling).
Later down the years, with the launch of the Model Y midsized electric SUV, Tesla went one step ahead and innovated structural battery packs.
Using the front trunk (coined the term ‘Frunk’) as a storage compartment was also the original design by Tesla, starting from the Model S. Here’s a list of Automotive Firsts that are attributed to the launch of the Tesla Model S EV:
- Battery Architecture
- Central Touchscreen
- Over-the-Air Updates
- Quickest Production Car
- Falcon-Wing Doors
- No Key Required
- Full-Self-Driving Hardware
- Direct Sales
- Frunk Storage
- Supercharger Network
- Lowest Drag Coefficient
- Lowest Center of Gravity
- No Annual Service
Tesla Model S and X Legacy
The things mentioned in the list above have been copied by automakers worldwide. And today’s generation takes them for granted. In 2012, these were nonexistent.
Musk reminds us of the humble beginnings of Tesla. The electric car company did not have a design studio back then. All the design work was done in the backyard of the SpaceX factory, inside a tent.
Remembering those early days at Tesla, Franz told the following story:
I mean, those early days in the back corner of SpaceX and the tent, the tent, you know, we didn’t even have a design studio.
We were on a floor like this, you know, falling often, and we would push the clay model of Model S through SpaceX factory every Friday and push it outside so we could evaluate it with Elon.
And right on Jack Northrop Drive, every car that driving by could see what we were doing, but you know, nobody cared. We were… it was like, it was like, you know, a garage band playing in Wembley Stadium at that point.
You know, we were like taking on the world with this amazing idea, but nobody believed in us.
Elon Musk and Tesla’s Engineering Lead, Lars Moravy, explained how the Tesla Model S was the first production car that was originally fully made by Tesla. The original Roadster was in part made by Lotus.
The first Model S and Model X were completely designed and engineered by the small Tesla team at the time. The Fremont factory was the only manufacturing plant that made these vehicles throughout their lifecycle.
Franz posted a stunning picture of one of the Signature Tesla Model S Plaid in Garnet Red color inside the light tunnel created for the event. According to Franz, this limited-edition paint is the updated version of the original Signature Red in the Founder’s Series Model S and X.
He also wrote:
After nearly 18 years I can stop working on Model S and X. We put so much love into these products, but will continue to pour that into the future products. Thanks to everyone who believed in and supported these cars through the years. We strived for the best and will never stop. Saying goodbye to something great and making room for something even greater!
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 CEO Elon Musk and Chief Designer Elon Musk remembered the history of the Model S and X as they handed over the Signature Edition cars (pics, videos, more).){kind=link}