As Sales Drop, Tesla Makes a Big Gamble on India
Invitations to the launch event began circulating on social media late last week. 'Launch Event. Exclusive Invite,' the sleek black cards read. 'Tesla Experience Center BKC.' The event is scheduled to take place from 11:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. local time, with guests asked to arrive early. The venue is located in Mumbai's upscale Bandra Kurla Complex.
As with most things Tesla, the invitation triggered a storm of reactions online, fervent excitement from fans, and sharp skepticism from critics. And it's no surprise. CEO Elon Musk's company is under enormous pressure, both financially and politically.
Tesla's sales have been declining for most of 2025, weighed down by a mix of aging models, intensifying global competition, and self-inflicted political damage. The company's current lineup includes the Model 3 sedan, the Model Y SUV (currently the world's best-selling electric vehicle), the Cybertruck, the Model S luxury sedan, and the Model X SUV. But Tesla hasn't launched a new passenger vehicle in years, and the lineup is beginning to show its age.
Meanwhile, legacy automakers and aggressive upstarts have closed the technology gap. General Motors, Ford, Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz, BYD, NIO, and others are rolling out new electric vehicles at a furious pace, often priced more competitively than Tesla's core offerings.
Adding to the pressure is Musk's increasingly polarizing public persona. Once a cult hero for tech progressives and climate advocates, Musk has alienated much of Tesla's original customer base with his far-right political rhetoric and attacks on perceived 'woke' institutions.
The company is also facing significant macroeconomic headwinds. In the last three months, Tesla's overall sales have declined by 13.5%. President Donald Trump's trade war has crippled sales in Canada, forcing a desperate, deep price cut on the Model Y. And in the United States, demand for electric vehicles is expected to soften with the expiration of the $7,500 federal tax credit on September 30.
Against this tumultuous backdrop, the Indian market couldn't have come at a better time.
India is now the third-largest auto market in the world, behind China and the United States. Although EV adoption in India remains low compared to Western countries, the sector is growing fast, fueled by government incentives and a rising urban middle class.
Tesla has had its eye on India for years, but repeated attempts to enter the market were blocked by disputes over local manufacturing requirements and high import taxes. That breakthrough finally came in early 2025, after Musk met with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi during a state visit to Washington.
'Spoke to @elonmusk and talked about various issues,' Modi posted on X last April. 'We discussed the immense potential for collaboration in the areas of technology and innovation.'
Musk responded: 'I am looking forward to visiting India later this year!'
It was an honor to speak with PM Modi.
I am looking forward to visiting India later this year! https://t.co/TYUp6w5Gys
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 19, 2025In anticipation of the launch, Tesla created an official account on X, @Tesla_India, posting a single tweet that read 'Coming soon.' Since Tesla does not have a factory in the country, it is expected that vehicles will be imported from its Gigafactory in Shanghai.
According to Bloomberg, Tesla has already shipped its first batch of vehicles, mostly Model Y SUVs. That hasn't stopped a wave of anticipation from building.
'Are bookings open?' one user posted on X.
Bookings are open?
— Nitish Bhatia (@NITISHBHATIA1) July 11, 2025
'Any word on when the first deliveries are?' another asked. 'Finally excited to see Tesla cars on Indian roads,' wrote a third. 'Any owners taking first deliveries, please record and share your thoughts or make a vlog.'
Awesome, finally excited to see Tesla cars on Indian roads. Any owners taking first deliveries, please record and share your thoughts or make a vlog. I will be willing to watch such videos as I am curious about the whole Tesla India experience. I'm sure lots of other folks are…
— Cybrtsla (@cybrtsla) July 11, 2025
'Finally the most cherished dream of @TeslaClubIN and car enthusiasts like me will end on July 15,' another user said. 'Finally long wait is over,' another added.
But skepticism remains. A ValueAct analyst warned: '$TSLA India will be even less competitive and profitable than Tesla China, which is getting clobbered.'
$TSLA India will be even less competitive and profitable than Tesla China which is getting clobbered https://t.co/yYvA5jZrUE
— Yaman Tasdivar (@ValueAnalyst1) July 11, 2025
Tesla's launch in India comes at a precarious time. The company is under pressure to reset the narrative, reignite sales, and reassure investors. Entering a new, massive market is a clear bet on growth. But it also raises questions about profitability, supply chain logistics, and whether Tesla can still lead the global EV race.
For now, the launch of Tesla's first showroom in Mumbai marks the start of a new chapter. The real test will be whether India becomes Tesla's next big success story, or just another headline in a rough year for Musk's empire.
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Motor Trend
13 minutes ago
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Uncertainty is everywhere in the automotive industry. On-again off-again tariffs, flat sales, the looming threat of Chinese automakers, and yes, electrification all present hurdles. Uncertainty on the latter—frequently conflated with automotive technological progress by enthusiasts—was top of mind for me at the 2025 Goodwood Festival of Speed. A ride-along over the weekend with Travis Pastrana in a 2025 Subaru WRX ARA24 and with Max McCrae in his uncle Colin's 1990 Subaru Legacy RS at the festival's Forest Rally Stage and watching the Festival's signature timed shootout has me thinking a bit differently about the march of progress. The 2025 Goodwood Festival of Speed showcased automotive progress with Chinese EVs, rallying with Travis Pastrana in a Subaru WRX, and debates on electrification's impact. The event also highlighted new car debuts and significant Chinese automaker presence, reflecting industry shifts. This summary was generated by AI using content from this MotorTrend article Read Next Pastrana, to most Americans, needs little introduction. Some know him for his Hall of Fame motocross career, a fearless freestyle motocross X Games champ, stuntman from Nitro Circus, or as a NASCAR racer. But rallying and rallycross, now that he's retired from competitive motocross due to a frightfully long list of injuries (including, as he was quick to point out, a broken urethra), has long seemed to be his second love. Pastrana recently rejoined Subaru Motorsports USA where he's competing in the American Rally Association. At Goodwood, he took me for a ride in Subaru's Open 4WD WRX ARA24 car. These cars are heavily modified from stock WRXs, featuring restricted 2.0-liter turbocharged flat-4s good for 320 hp and 380 lb-ft of torque, running through a six-speed sequential transmission and mechanical differential to all four wheels. At each corner the stock suspension is swapped for new springs and dampers with a foot of travel and 15-inch wheels on gravel rally tires. Short of the hybridized million-dollar tube frame rally cars now running in the World Rally Championship, the open class WRX ARA car is about as bleeding edge as you can get in the rally world. The WRX ARA's runs—and those of the Toyota and Hyundai WRC teams— wouldn't be officially counted on the Forest Rally Stage, but the fact that the festival was posting times was enough to bring out the full competitor in Pastrana and the rest of the Subaru team as they sought to post the fastest time in one of their laps. Slower and wider than the Rally1 WRC cars (not to mention cheaper, too), the WRX ARA24 would have its work cut out for it. Our run was, in a word, quick. 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McCrae had to work twice as hard to get every last bit of performance out of that Legacy, which leaves less room for the driver to actually focus on driving and maximizing their own performance. Progress rears its head again during the Festival of Speed's headlining timed shoot out on Sunday afternoon, where competitors vie to post the quickest time up the 1.16-mile, nine-turn hillclimb. Last year the Subaru Project Midnight WRX, a highly modified WRX ARA rally car, built, like the rally car by Subaru Motorsports USA technical partner Vermont Sports Cars, with 670 hp designed to dominate on this single event and driven by Scott Speed came in second to a quad-motor electric Ford Supervan. This year, the team, facing a 2,000-plus horsepower quad-motor Ford F-150 Lightning Supertruck, expected the same results despite some changes based on Speed's feedback from last year. 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In between, they could enjoy hillclimb runs, festival food and drinks, live music, shopping, and kid play areas. Some automakers even took the opportunity to debut new cars, such as the 2026 Hyundai Ioniq 6 N and Ioniq 6 N Performance, Honda Super EV concept (a little Kei-sized city EV), and the Porsche Cayenne Electric, and run them up the hill for the public. Where else can you see a new car debut and hit the road in the same day? Goodwood, that's where. Hot commodities: When it comes to the infield auto show–like section of Goodwood, we think the three individually most popular vehicles were the Ioniq 6 N, the Renault 5 E-Tech, and the Renault's sporty cousin, the Alpine A290. Hyundai's large display featured both new Ioniq 6 N iterations front-and-center and there was never a time we walked by where they weren't surrounded by throngs of people. Even the tech talk Hyundai did on the cars seemed well-attended. 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Car and Driver
27 minutes ago
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Tested: 2025 Jeep Wagoneer Carries the Eight-Seater Torch
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The 2021 Jeep Grand Cherokee L marked the third installment, a side plot to the real blockbuster, the 2022 Wagoneer, which rebooted a historic nameplate and soon after welcomed the return of a standard Hurricane engine. view exterior photos Michael Simari | Car and Driver The story of any third row begins with access—the literal climb up and through the back doors. The Wagoneer's running boards seem unduly wide when getting in the driver's seat, but steps get more important the farther back one sits. The Wagoneer's large rear door openings and ample footing make third-row access unexpectedly easy and reassuring. And kudos to the exterior designers who integrated the available retracting running boards into the clean, if overly boxy, design; when stowed, they look like contrasting-color rocker panels. HIGHS: Solid third-row space, functional boxy design, tech that's easy to use. In the underground labs where automakers devise ways to move the second-row seating, Jeep threw one button and one lever at the issue. Press the button on the second-row seatback shoulder, and the entire seat leans forward and slides. You can do this even with a baby seat secured to the chair. Pull the lever on the side of the base, and the seatback folds flat. Pull the lever again, and the folded seat flips up against the first-row seatbacks. Pick your method, then step on to a running board wide enough to do a musical number from Wicked and make your entry. view interior Photos Michael Simari | Car and Driver A third row, like football and prostate exams, is a game of inches. Jeep designers arranged the hash marks to give adults the desired outcomes. You won't be swinging cats back here, but the average adult won't bang their knees or head on the architecture either. At 83.6 inches wide and up to 79.3 inches high with its air springs fully raised, the Wagoneer is 2.5 inches wider than a Chevrolet Suburban and up to 3.7 inches taller. Those specs and smart design choices explain why the Wagoneer's third-row headroom beats the Suburban by 0.8 inch, shoulder room outdoes the Chevy by 1.6 inches, and the Jeep cedes just 0.1 inch of legroom to the much longer 'Burb. Compared to the Chevy Tahoe, the Wagoneer's 180 cubic feet of passenger space and 27 cubic feet of cargo space behind the third row eke out two more fractional wins. Oddly, though, the Wagoneer's 117 cubic feet of cargo room behind the first row gives up just under six cubes to the Tahoe. LOWS: Eight-passenger arrangement requires small sacrifices, some low-rent cabin materials, light body-on-frame jiggle. Adults will be comfy in the gallery too. Bottoms slide naturally into the pocket of the canted bench with bolsters long enough to feel natural under the leg. The pads are flat, but the seats are comfortable. Stadium seating puts eyelines above the second-row headrests, allaying carsickness. A glass panel overhead and large side windows let light into a cabin otherwise designed for mammals that see better with their ears than their eyes. And, oh, the amenities! Cupholders and USB ports galore for the third row, even two coat hangers. view interior Photos Michael Simari | Car and Driver Wagoneer engineers aced the hardest part of the test of any full-size SUV, which is the third row. They fumbled some of the easy answers farther forward. The second-row bench in our tester, plenty wide for three adults, is a $595 option as part of the 8-Passenger Seating package; two captain's chairs come standard. This bench, a larger version of the third row—elevated, canted, and flat—could use more cushioning in the backrests, and the bolsters could stand to be longer. Choosing the bench eliminates two small cupholders at the back of the front-row console, leaving only two door pockets for beverages. And the containers better be sealed because the molded door pockets are angled. view interior Photos Michael Simari | Car and Driver The driver's seat is pleasant enough and well cushioned, although marred by another token attempt at contouring despite numerous cross-stitched panels. The puzzling bits are elsewhere, like the pebbled plastic dash topper. It's an insult to pebbles and can't even match the meager pretensions of the plain black plastic covering the lower dash. Being fair to Jeep, the brand isn't alone in subbing economy-car materials into luxury price points. The Wagoneer's instrument panel may be representative of an SUV that starts at $62,040, though not one that in flagship Series III Super 4X4 trim totaled $86,120 with options. But the domestic competition is doing it too. At least the aluminum strip separating the upper and lower dash is nice. A 10.1-inch infotainment screen is the literal bright spot in the somber, black interior (the other interior color choice is light gray). Smaller than its bezel would suggest, its dark flanks contain rows of buttons that can be hard to see in strong daylight. view exterior photos Michael Simari | Car and Driver The driving experience averages out to a happy medium between extremes. At the suboptimal end, our Wagoneer rode on 22-inch wheels (20-inchers are standard on lesser trims) wearing Pirelli Scorpion Verde All Season tires. When we tested the Wagoneer on launch, also on 22s, we noted that "a little residual body-on-frame jiggle runs through the structure after abrupt inputs or bumps." This jiggle remains. The result is a minor massage of frequencies delivered to the driver's seat as the wheels jitterbug over American roads that haven't gotten any smoother. view interior Photos Michael Simari | Car and Driver At the delightful end, outstanding body control makes this massive SUV surprisingly composed through the twisties. Today's Hurricane engine is a twin-turbocharged 3.0-liter inline-six making 420 horsepower and 468 pound-feet of torque in baseline trim, enough guts to hustle the Wagoneer's 6129 pounds to 60 in 5.3 seconds. Combined with fairly direct steering, fine brake modulation, and a sufficient-if-not-outstanding 0.75 g of lateral grip, Jeep's biggest boxcar is more capable on twisty B roads than you might think. Everyday driving in the daily commute or weekend errand duty finds a satisfying mean. A digital gauge display requires no familiarization, and it's easy to find and operate all the knobs and buttons (again, if it's not too bright out) and the touchscreen. Passing comes easy, the spurt from 30 to 50 mph needing 3.0 seconds, while going from 50 to 70 mph takes 3.6 seconds. At that latter highway speed, a modest 67 decibels of cabin noise makes for a soothing environment—or cue up the crisp, punchy McIntosh audio system and flood the byways with sound. Stopping from 70 mph takes an extra-long 207 feet, though, 10 feet beyond the last Wagoneer we tested. view exterior photos Michael Simari | Car and Driver Some details: We're glad Jeep continues to offer standard and adaptive cruise control on the same vehicle, because there are situations where one is more useful than the other. The sunshade over the third row is manual, so if it's open, a solo driver has to make a trip back to the bleachers to close it. A shame there's no button for the task, but a motor mechanism might have cut into headroom, and we'd rather have the headroom. On the other hand, one can lower the second- and third-row headrests from the driver's seat. VERDICT: Fourth time's the charm. More than one successful Hollywood screenwriter will tell you that good movies start with great endings. The Jeep Wagoneer lives up to the maxim on both counts, its third row one of the best endings in the business, the rest of the show well worth the steep but competitive price of admission. Specifications Specifications 2025 Jeep Wagoneer Series III Super 4X4 Vehicle Type: front-engine, all-wheel-drive, 8-passenger, 4-door wagon PRICE Base/As Tested: $82,535/$86,120 Options: Rear Seat Video Group 1 (video USB port, Amazon Fire TV built-in, dual 10.1-inch second-row video screens), $2595; 8-Passenger Seating package (40/40/40-split tilt-and-slide second-row bench seat with manual recline, first-row floor console, 7650-pound gross vehicle weight rating), $595; Mopar Interior Protection package (all-season floor mats and cargo tray), $395 ENGINE twin-turbocharged and intercooled DOHC 24-valve inline-6, aluminum block and head, direct fuel injection Displacement: 183 in3, 2993 cm3 Power: 420 hp @ 5200 rpm Torque: 468 lb-ft @ 3500 rpm TRANSMISSION 8-speed automatic CHASSIS Suspension, F/R: control arms/multilink Brakes, F/R: 14.9-in vented disc/14.8-in vented disc Tires: Pirelli Scorpion Verde All Season 285/45R-22 114H M+S DIMENSIONS Wheelbase: 123.0 in Length: 214.7 in Width: 83.6 in Height: 76.7–79.3 in Passenger Volume, F/M/R: 65/65/50 ft3 Cargo Volume, Behind F/M/R: 117/71/27 ft3 Curb Weight: 6129 lb C/D TEST RESULTS 60 mph: 5.3 sec 1/4-Mile: 13.9 sec @ 98 mph 100 mph: 14.4 sec Results above omit 1-ft rollout of 0.3 sec. Rolling Start, 5–60 mph: 6.1 sec Top Gear, 30–50 mph: 3.0 sec Top Gear, 50–70 mph: 3.6 sec Top Speed (gov ltd): 114 mph Braking, 70–0 mph: 207 ft Roadholding, 300-ft Skidpad: 0.75 g C/D FUEL ECONOMY Observed: 18 mpg 75-mph Highway Driving: 22 mpg 75-mph Highway Range: 580 mi EPA FUEL ECONOMY Combined/City/Highway: 19/16/23 mpg C/D TESTING EXPLAINED
Car and Driver
28 minutes ago
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