Tesla's 'Master Plan 3' is coming March 1, says Elon Musk

Elon Musk will present his third "master plan" during Tesla's Investor Day event on March 1, the CEO announced on Twitter last night. The plan would pave the way for "a fully sustainable energy future for the Earth", adding that "the future is bright!"

Musk has been teasing the third iteration of Tesla's strategic vision for about a year. Unlike the first titled "Master Plan" and "Master Plan, Part Deux", this edition will include updates about Musk's other two companies, SpaceX and The Boring Company, he said in a March 2022 tweet.

"The core Tesla theme will be stretched to the extreme size needed to move humanity away from fossil fuels and onto AI," Musk wrote. "But I will also include sections about SpaceX, Tesla and The Boring Company."

Tesla has already said it will reveal concrete details about its next-generation vehicle platform during its Investor Day event. The company is working on a refreshed version of the Tesla Model 3 as well as a robotaxi designed as a shared vehicle.

First "master plan"

The plan was first publicized on August 2, 2006, in a blog post titled "The Secret Tesla Motors Master Plan (Just Between You and Me)". At the time, Tesla only had one model for sale: the Tesla Roadster. But the company's "long-term plan" was to introduce a range of electric vehicles, including "affordably priced family cars". The first plan was a detailed look at how Tesla would move from a niche maker of electric sports cars to a mainstream automaker.

In essence, the plan was a simple look at the strategy Tesla would execute over the next decade: building a sports car (the roadster); use that money to build a more affordable car (the Model S); use that money to build a more affordable car (Model 3 and Model Y); And provide power generation options (house batteries, solar panels, etc.).

part deux

Ten years later, on July 20, 2016, Musk released a second plan focused on selling integrated energy generation and storage and expanding into other forms of ground transportation such as trucks and buses as well as autonomous driving technology. It also touched on Tesla's plan to allow owners of cars to share their vehicles with others in order to earn money when the car is not in use — a goal the company has yet to achieve.

Part Deux is also where we get our first hint of the Cybertruck—a "new type of pickup truck"—as well as "heavy-duty trucks and high-passenger-density urban transportation." But while Tesla has delivered on its promise of an electric semi truck, there has been no progress on an urban transportation vehicle.

Musk's The Boring Company once positioned itself as a futuristic transit system, but has since scrapped those plans in favor of the current "Teslas in Tunnel" service that operates in only one city.

What's in part three?

Robotaxis and next-gen platforms will surely be more developed during Musk's presentation. Given his focus on scaling Tesla's operations to peak size, we should expect some mention of the long-promised $25,000 EV. And there's little mention of the company's controversial full self-driving system and how it's guaranteed to plan into Musk's stalled vision of an autonomous future.