Elon Musk SNUBBED by Apple CEO over potential Tesla buyout during ‘darkest days’
ELON MUSK once approached Apple CEO Tim Cook over buying out a then-struggling Tesla according to one of his latest tweets.
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The Tesla CEO took to social media to respond to rumours Apple is developing its own self-driving electric car. Apple’s iCar followed a livestream of Tesla’s battery, with Mr Musk taking issue with some of the design choices for the rival company’s engine. After calling the rumours of Apple entering the car market “strange, if true”, he said he was rejected by Mr Cook when he approached him for a potential buyout of Tesla.
Mr Musk said he offered Apple’s CEO the opportunity to buy Tesla for one 10th of its current market value.
He said on Twitter: “During the darkest days of the Model 3 program, I reached out to Tim Cook to discuss the possibility of Apple acquiring Tesla (for 1/10 of our current value).
“He refused to take the meeting.”
Tesla is currently worth $607 billion (£453.5 billion), with Mr Musk likely referring to a period in 2016 or 2017 where the company struggled to launch its Model 3 line of electric cars.
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Tesla’s Model 3 production suffered from major issues, with Mr Musk previously claiming the company was just one month away from bankruptcy during the car’s development.
Mr Musk also once described the development of the Model 3 as “production and logistics hell”.
Tesla had to fly in parts for the Model 3 from Germany and set up and additional assembly line in California to speed up production.
In 2018, the CEO said he was sleeping on the factory floor and wearing the same clothes for several days in a row as he wanted to have his “circumstances to be worse than anyone else at the company”.
Apple has been rumoured to have been working on an electric car to rival Tesla since 2014.
Leaked notes from Apple were shared by Reuters, claiming the company plans to begin production on a self-driving car in 2024.
Other leaked information claimed Apple plans to use a unique “monocell” design, which bulks up the individual cells in the battery and frees up space, and the company is also exploring chemistry for the battery called LFP, or lithium iron phosphate.
One person linked to the Apple plans said to Reuters: “It’s next level. Like the first time you saw the iPhone.”
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Mr Musk took issue with some of the planned features of Apple’s self-driving “iCar”.
He said in response to the notes: “Tesla already uses iron-phosphate for medium range cars made in our Shanghai factory.
“A monocell is electrochemically impossible, as max voltage is ~100X too low.
“Maybe they meant cells bonded together, like our structural battery pack?”
Mr Musk is now the second richest man in the world, only behind Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos.
The Tesla CEO and SpaceX founder has a personal fortune of $155 billion after the electric car manufacturer surged in value this year.
Recently a German court has halted Tesla’s plans for a €4 billion factory over fears it would threaten a protected species of sand lizard.
The factory was expected to open next summer in Grünheide, south-east of Berlin, and aimed to produce around 500,000 cars a year as well as batteries.