Shares of Tesla popped 4% in Friday’s pre-market trade to $375 apiece after the electric vehicle maker unveiled a redesigned Roadster powered by rocket-style thrusters developed in collaboration with SpaceX, whose shares climbed 1%.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk unveiled what he described as a “flying” car, equipped with thrusters, during a livestreamed event at his SpaceX rocket company’s facility on Thursday. Musk revealed his new Roadster sports car during a launch event at a SpaceX test facility in Texas.
During the demo, which was livestreamed on Tesla’s X account, the car launched from a steep steel ramp and performed a full barrel roll in mid-air before landing on its wheels.
“Flying cars are real,” Musk said during the event. He added that while the vehicle’s “success is not guaranteed… it will probably work.”
The sports car did not have a driver during the demo “to make sure we don’t kill anyone,” he added. Musk said the car was equipped with 10 nozzles and “ultra-high-pressure air tanks” to propel itself into the air and accelerate quickly on the ground.
The tech billionaire described the development as “what happens when you have a collaboration with the world’s best car company and the world’s best rocket company,” referring to Tesla and SpaceX.
The vehicle, which is designed to lean into aerospace aesthetics, features two seats and a Cybertruck-style steer-by-wire system. Tesla showed a video of the vehicle accelerating from zero to 60 miles per hour in under one second.
The vehicle has been subject to numerous delays since it was first announced in 2017. The original Roadster, Tesla’s first product, was launched in 2008 and discontinued in 2012.
Could Tesla’s new Roadster revive SpaceX merger speculation?
Viram Shah, founder & CEO of Vested Finance, said, “Tesla is also back in focus after unveiling the new Roadster, which uses SpaceX-developed thrusters and demonstrated limited flight capabilities. The launch of the vehicle seems unlikely to materially change Tesla’s near-term financials, but it reinforces how closely Tesla and SpaceX are beginning to overlap technologically.”
“That has also revived merger speculation. Barclays has argued that a Tesla-SpaceX combination is increasingly becoming a consensus expectation among investors, potentially combining Tesla’s physical AI businesses, such as robotaxis and Optimus, with SpaceX’s AI, infrastructure, and semiconductor ambitions. For now, however, this remains speculation rather than a confirmed transaction,” Shah further added.
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