Tesla Inc CEO Elon Musk on Friday said that the company would continue to trade publicly, weeks after suggesting that he would take the pioneering electric carmaker private.
Musk on Thursday met Tesla’s board of directors and “let them know” that he believed “the better path is for Tesla to remain public,” he wrote on the company blog, adding: “The Board indicated that they agree.”
Musk on Aug. 7 surprised markets by announcing on Twitter that he wanted to take Tesla private at US$420 per share. Shares have fallen more than 20 percent since.
After the announcement, Musk came under extensive scrutiny over his Twitter statements related to the proposal, especially a claim that Tesla had “secured” funding for the move.
Tesla shares tumbled on reports that the US Securities and Exchange Commission had subpoenaed Musk to talk about the tweet.
Normally, such a major announcement — taking a huge company private — would be explained in detail beforehand to regulators.
Musk said that based on his discussions with shareholders, as well as an assessment by financial advisers Silver Lake Management LLC, Goldman Sachs Group Inc and Morgan Stanley, “it’s apparent that most of Tesla’s existing shareholders believe we are better off as a public company.”
Even though the majority of shareholders “said they would remain with Tesla if we went private, the sentiment, in a nutshell, was ‘please don’t do this,’” he wrote. “I knew the process of going private would be challenging, but it’s clear that it would be even more time-consuming and distracting than initially anticipated.”
The company “must stay focused on ramping [up the] Model 3 and becoming profitable,” Musk wrote. “We will not achieve our mission of advancing sustainable energy unless we are also financially sustainable.”
The Model 3 is a US$35,000 mid-sized electric sedan that the company — which still has not made a profit — is banking will be its runaway hit.
Musk acknowledged that he was exhausted from overwork following the market-rattling Aug. 7 tweet.
“This past year has been the most difficult and painful year of my career,” Musk told the New York Times in an interview on Thursday last week.
The newspaper said that the swashbuckling CEO choked up at times as he talked about working endless hours trying to meet production deadlines, spending his 47th birthday in June at work and almost missing his brother’s wedding.
Musk described the infamous privatization tweet — which included an assurance that funding for going private was secured — as an attempt to be transparent.
The news shocked investors, market analysts and even Tesla board members.
Musk said on the company blog that his much scrutinized statements about financing were based on his conversations with Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund and other investors.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”