Tesla, Elon Musk Introduce The Home Battery
Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) is hosting an event this evening to unveil a new product line. The presentation is expected to begin at 8:00 p.m. PT / 11:00 p.m. ET; below is a live blog of the event.
12:37:20 a.m.: The event has ended.
12:36:47 a.m.: Powerpack and Gigafactory will continue to use Tesla's open source policy.
12:35:50 a.m.: Musk: What we're designing in the Gigafactory is (essentially) a giant machine.
12:34:23 a.m.: 900 million Powerpacks could be used to power every home in the world. You would need 2 billion to power everything else.
12:31:42 a.m.: Battery will start shipping in three to four months. Ramp up will be slow initially.
12:30:21 a.m.: Musk: "You can order the Powerwall right now on the Tesla website."
12:28:29 a.m.: Solar panels + Powerwall will allow users to go completely off the grid, Musk said. The batteries are designed to be stacked. Up to nine Powerwalls can be combined.
12:27:50 a.m.: Musk said that the battery "looks like a beautiful sculpture on the wall." It will be sold in multiple colors.
12:27:11 a.m.: The Powerwall battery looks much smaller and smoother than the one seen in pictures ahead of th eevent.
12:26:41 a.m.: Musk: The problem with existing solar batteries is that they suck.
12:25:01 a.m.: Musk said that a very small amount of batteries are needed to transfer from fossil fuels to solar energy.
12:24:39 a.m.: Musk: It's important to smooth out energy generation and retain enough to use at night.
12:23:27 a.m.: Musk said that very little land is needed to get the US off fossil fuels.
12:21:16 a.m.: Elon Musk thinks Powerwall is a "fairly obvious" solution. Said the solution involves two parts. The first is the sun.
12:20:23 a.m.: The event has finally begun.
12:16:14 a.m.: Tesla fans are getting very antsy:
I saw that this Tesla event started at 8pm earlier...then 8:30pm...now it's 9:15pm and it still hasn't started? @elonmusk
— jammasternate (@jammasternate) May 1, 2015
12:12:54 a.m.: For the record, all of the information Benzinga has received thus far has come from Twitter (as noted below) or the official press kit. The event itself has not started yet.
12:10:23 a.m.: Tesla has also partnered with SolarEdge, a global player in the PV inverter market. The two firms partnered "for the joint development of a PV storage and backup power solution for the worldwide residential solar market."
12:09:37 a.m.: Tesla is collaborating with TreeHouse (a sustainable home improvement store) to sell Powerwall.
12:07:40 a.m.: Tesla also said that deliveries will begin in late summer.
12:06:21 a.m.: Tesla will charge installers $3,500 for the 10kWh version and $3,000 for the 7kWh iteration. This price excludes inverter and installation.
12:04:08 a.m.: Additional insights from the press kit: "The Powerwall is available in 10kWh, optimized for backup applications or 7kWh optimized for daily use applications. Both can be connected with solar or grid and both can provide backup power."
12:01:42 a.m.: The press kit also revealed that the battery can provide a few different benefits, including:
11:59:19 p.m.: According to the press kit, "The Tesla Powerwall is a rechargeable lithium-ion battery designed to store energy at a residential level for load shifting, backup power and self-consumption of solar power generation."
11:58:10 p.m.: The press kit is out, but the presentation hasn't started yet.
11:50:24 p.m.: Interesting news via Twitter:
11:47:18 p.m.: This seems to be inevitable:
11:45:50 p.m.: Is Elon Musk ready to channel his inner Steve Jobs?
11:43:15 p.m.: People are starting to get antsy.
11:40:02 p.m.: Twitter users are overwhelmed with excitement -- and light humor.
11:32:46 p.m.: Camera crews appear to be primed and ready to go.
11:31:21 p.m.: Popcorn? Why didn't I think of that!?
11:25:05 p.m.: It appears that the event is getting ready to begin.
11:19:08 p.m.: This likely has very little to do with the 30-minute delay for tonight's event:
11:15:51 p.m.: Tesla won't talk about earnings until next week, but the company recently announced that it delivered 10,030 vehicles in Q1.
11:11:24 p.m.: Tesla co-founder Elon Musk's most recent tweet was a tease about tonight's event:
11:09:39 p.m.: Shares of Tesla are up less than one percent in after hours trading.
11:06:27 p.m.: Here's a way to kill some time while you wait for the event to begin.
11:02:55 p.m.:Tesla's website now indicates that the event is starting at 8:30 p.m. PT / 11:30 p.m. ET.
10:59:22 p.m.: Battery confirmed? The press kit came in this:
10:55:01 p.m.: Some people are really big fans.
10:51:42 p.m.: Tesla also announced that it will host its annual stockholder meeting on Tuesday, June 9 at 2:00 p.m. PT / 5:00 p.m. ET.
10:48:12 p.m.: Tesla recently announced that it will announce its first quarter results on Wednesday May 6 after the close. A conference call will follow at 2:30 p.m. PT / 5:30 p.m. ET.
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