Tesla chief designer talks Cybertruck and teases upcoming new EV
Tesla chief designer Franz von Holzhausen gave a rare interview where he discussed the Cybertruck design and teased an upcoming new Tesla model.
At Tesla, it’s fairly rare for executives not named “Musk” to be authorized to talk to the media.
Franz von Holzhausen, who has been chief designer at Tesla for over a decade, is a rare exception as he sometimes gives out interviews. The chief designer gave an interview to CNBC where he discussed the Tesla Cybertruck’s design.
Here’s the video interview, and you can find some interesting quotes that we pulled below:
von Holzhausen confirmed that the truck’s radical design is the result of the manufacturing process that Tesla needs to adopt to build the electric truck with a stainless steel exoskeleton:
The Cybertruck is one of these rare moments where in a way, form followed function. A lot of times we put the form in front of the function. Especially in the automotive world. And it’s really tough to mix the two, but Cybertruck is really born out of the idea of a different way of manufacturing, a material that put toughness on the outside. So we really wanted to use stainless steel as a material so that the hardest part of the vehicle was on the outside, not the delicate paint. And it felt right for a truck that’s used in like a Swiss army knife in any kind of environment has to be tough.
The designer added about the limitations of stainless steel and how Tesla handled the design, despite those limitations:
So stainless steel is really tough to form, especially when you make it bulletproof or thicker to withstand impacts and not be damaged. And so we really looked at new ways of manufacturing. You could only break form and form it in one direction. You can’t do compound curves or things with the thickness of the stainless steel that we’re using. So it really led us to a design that was really planar, really simplistic, and it was also a chance to break the paradigm of what pickup trucks have been for the past 60 or 70 years. The same there’s kind of this three box shape, and we just thought from an aerodynamic perspective, having a covered back a sloping roof would also be helpful. And oddly enough, it may not look it, but the Cybertruck is an incredibly aerodynamic vehicle.
That’s fair, though I would add “for a pickup truck.”
von Holzhausen was asked about his favorite design at Tesla so far, and the designer said that it is “the one that’s coming,” but one that he “can’t talk about.”
The next vehicle that Tesla is expected to unveil is its “robotaxi,” a new EV dedicated to self-driving and being used primarily as some kind of driverless Uber.
Not much else is known about the vehicle, but CEO Elon Musk said that it will be “futuristic-looking.”
von Holzhausen also said that he is excited about the Cybertruck’s radical design being on the road as it should create some interesting visuals. Tesla is expected to bring the Cybertruck to production in mid-2023.
In terms of the production version, the chief designer said it will be extremely similar to the original prototype unveiled in 2019, except a few percentage points smaller.
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![Day 1 of the Electrek Formula Sun Grand Prix 2025 [Gallery]](https://i0.wp.com/electrek.co/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2025/07/54629423281_6315c46dff_k.jpg?resize=1200,628&quality=82&strip=all&ssl=1)
Today was the official start of racing at the Electrek Formula Sun Grand Prix 2025! There was a tremendous energy (and heat) on the ground at NCM Motorsports Park as nearly a dozen teams took to the track. Currently, as of writing, Stanford is ranked #1 in the SOV (Single-Occupant Vehicle) class with 68 registered laps. However, the fastest lap so far belongs to UC Berkeley, which clocked a 4:45 on the 3.15-mile track. That’s an average speed of just under 40 mph on nothing but solar energy. Not bad!
In the MOV (Multi-Occupant Vehicle) class, Polytechnique Montréal is narrowly ahead of Appalachian State by just 4 laps. At last year’s formula sun race, Polytechnique Montréal took first place overall in this class, and the team hopes to repeat that success. It’s still too early for prediction though, and anything can happen between now and the final day of racing on Saturday.
Congrats to the teams that made it on track today. We look forward to seeing even more out there tomorrow. In the meantime, here are some shots from today via the event’s wonderful photographer Cora Kennedy.
Stay tuned for more!
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The numbers are in and they are all bad for Tesla fans – the company sold just 5,000 Cybertruck models in Q4 of 2025, and built some 30% more “other” vehicles than it delivered. It just gets worse and worse, on today’s tension-building episode of Quick Charge!
We’ve also got day 1 coverage of the 2025 Electrek Formula Sun Grand Prix, reports that the Tesla Optimus program is in chaos after its chief engineer jumps ship, and a look ahead at the fresh new Hyundai IONIQ 2 set to bow early next year, thanks to some battery specs from the Kia EV2.
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Tesla has launched its new Oasis Supercharger, the long-promised EV charging station of the future, with a solar farm and off-grid batteries.
Early in the deployment of the Supercharger network, Tesla promised to add solar arrays and batteries to the Supercharger stations, and CEO Elon Musk even said that most stations would be able to operate off-grid.
While Tesla did add solar and batteries to a few stations, the vast majority of them don’t have their own power system or have only minimal solar canopies.
Back in 2016, I asked Musk about this, and he said that it would now happen as Tesla had the “pieces now in place” with Supercharger V3, Powerpack V2, and SolarCity:
All of these pieces have been in place for years, and Tesla has now discontinued the Powerpack in favor of the Megapack. The Supercharger network is also transitioning to V4 stations.
Yet, solar and battery deployment haven’t accelerated much in the decade since Musk made that comment, but it is finally happening.
Last year, Tesla announced a new project called ‘Oasis’, which consists of a new model Supercharger station with a solar farm and battery storage enabling off-grid operations in Lost Hills, California.
Tesla has now unveiled the project and turned on most of the Supercharger stalls:
The project consists of 168 chargers, with half of them currently operational, making it one of the largest Supercharger stations in the world. However, that’s not even the most notable aspect of it.
The station is equipped with 11 MW of ground-mounted solar panels and canopies, spanning 30 acres of land, and 10 Tesla Megapacks with a total energy storage capacity of 39 MWh.
It can be operated off-grid, which is the case right now, according to Tesla.
With off-grid operations, Tesla was about to bring 84 stalls online just in time for the Fourth of July travel weekend. The rest of the stalls and a lounge are going to open later this year.
Electrek’s Take
This is awesome. A bit late, but awesome. This is what charging stations should be like: fully powered by renewable energy.
Unfortunately, it will be much harder to open those stations in the future due to legislation that Trump and the Republican Party have just passed, which removes incentives for solar and energy storage, adds taxes on them, and removes incentives to build batteries – all things that have helped Tesla considerably over the last few years.
The US is likely going to have a few tough years for EV adoption and renewable energy deployment.
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