Patrick Bet David, successful entrepreneur, podcaster and youtuber has posted the case that Elon Musk cut the Tesla Supercharging infrastructure team and slowed/paused Supercharging network buildout as a power move to get concessions and leverage over other car makers and the government.

Tesla Has to Focus Everything on AI – FSD, Robotaxi and Teslabot

This move could save Tesla $200-300 million per year in expenses if this was for North America only and maybe $600 million if it was globally. Tesla needs to focus capital and research spending on AI (full self driving and robotaxi and teslabot). AI success in the next two years could triple of 10X the value of Tesla. If there was a 2 year pause in supercharging infrastructure then Tesla does not go to 78,000 charging connections but stays at 57,000. However, Tesla has about 25% of its chargers more fully subsidized in North America. Tesla would not pull back construction to zero but to the levels supported by the US, US states and in other countries. Tesla would also continue to build out charging network where it is needed to support their own customers and where there is very good government grant support.

Tesla Will Meet Obligations But Could Ration

All North America carmakers need the Tesla Supercharging network as all other EV charging is vastly inferior. The other chargers are frequently broken.

Tesla has been awarded $28 million-worth of federal contracts for superchargers. This is 14% of the total awards, according to data from EVAdoption, a data consulting firm. Joint Office of Energy and Transportation, which runs the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure program, or NEVI, said 10 states have selected Tesla as a charging provider for their projects. President Biden had promised build 500,000 electric vehicle charging stations in the United States by 2030.