Tesla Model S EV UK launch – Tesla considering patent giveaway

Elon Musk (pictured) launches RHD Model S in UK

The electric Tesla Model S – probably the only electric car that makes sense – has finally been launched in the UK in right hand drive, with the first five Model S customers taking delivery of their cars. With a starting price of £50,280 (after the £5k taxpayer bribe) the Model S represents a real first for EVs; the first EV that can do pretty much anything an ICE car can, and more beside.

With a range of up to 312 miles, seating for up to seven (well, 5+2), low running costs, great performance (0-60mph in 4.2 seconds) low service costs, no VED, no congestion charge and, at least until 2015, no BIK for business users, it’s not only almost as practical as a comparable ICE car it’s massively cheaper to run.

With plans for a Supercharger Network to recharge Teslas in half an hour spreading across main arterial routes in the UK, the Tesla Model X SUV arriving in 2015 and plans for a BMW 3 Series rival that costs half of the Model S, Tesla are on a roll.

But it also looks like Tesla boss, Elon Musk, is planning to do more to shake up the stalled EV market and has hinted heavily at plans to free up Tesla’s EV patents to encourage more EV makers in to the market.

Speaking to the BBC, Musk was asked if he was considering giving the technology a way, and replied “you’re on the right track.

He went on to say:

We don’t want to cut a path through the jungle and then lay a bunch of landmines behind us.

Which is completely the opposite tack to the one Musk has taken with another Musk project – the Space X project – where Space X aren’t even filing patents for fear they’ll be stolen. Which, assuming you can keep your technology ‘in-house’, is a wise position.

But it seems Musk is now keen to make his mark by freeing-up Tesla’s EV patents to become the man that made EVs properly viable.

Watch this space.

By Cars UK