{"id":114891,"date":"2017-03-28T13:16:22","date_gmt":"2017-03-28T17:16:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thedetroitbureau.com\/?p=114891"},"modified":"2017-03-28T13:16:22","modified_gmt":"2017-03-28T17:16:22","slug":"chinese-investment-firm-takes-5-stake-in-tesla","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/2017\/03\/chinese-investment-firm-takes-5-stake-in-tesla\/","title":{"rendered":"Chinese Investment Firm Takes 5% Stake in Tesla"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Tesla CEO Elon Musk said the company needed an infusion of cash, and it got it, from Tencent, which now holds 5% of Tesla stock.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

One of China\u2019s largest technology investment firms has taken a 5% stake in the U.S. battery-electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla.<\/p>\n

In a public filing, Tencent Holdings said it has purchased nearly 8.2 million shares of Tesla stock. The automaker\u2019s shares have been on a roller-coaster ride in recent months as the company struggled to fund the development of its critical Model 3 battery sedan.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Financial News!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The automaker\u2019s shares surged on news of the Chinese investment.<\/p>\n

Tesla also got a dose of bad news on Tuesday as news reports indicated that one of the maker\u2019s vehicles, operating in semi-autonomous Autopilot mode, struck a motorcycle being driven by a Phoenix police officer. The incident occurred last week, shortly before a separate Arizona crash involving an autonomous vehicle operated by ride-sharing service Uber.<\/p>\n

(Will the new Tesla Model 3 be the safest car ever? <\/em><\/strong>Click Here<\/a><\/span><\/strong> to find out.)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The $1.78 billion investment by Tencent occurred, in part, through the stock offering Tesla staged earlier this month. That move helped the automaker raise about $1.4 billion \u2013 funding that was considered critical to completing the development of the new Model 3 sedan.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Tesla's hurtling toward the launch of the Model 3 and now has a new large investor in the company: Tencent.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Model 3, which is set to go into production in July, is Tesla\u2019s first mainstream vehicle, and is expected to boost the maker\u2019s volumes dramatically. CEO Elon Musk forecast sales will reach 500,000 in 2018 \u2013 about 10 times Tesla\u2019s 2015 sales.<\/p>\n

But prior to the latest stock offering, and in light of recent losses, Musk warned that Tesla\u2019s finances were \u201cclose to the edge.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tencent has not revealed what its plans are for Tesla. The investment company is worth about $300 billion.<\/p>\n

(<\/em><\/strong>Click Here<\/a><\/span><\/strong> to see why Tesla owners feel such a strong bond to their vehicles.)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

In the case of the Tesla Autopilot crash, the Arizona Republic reported the incident occurred on an exit ramp off the Black Canyon Freeway. An officer had stopped at a red light with a Tesla Model X SUV behind him. The battery-car briefly stopped before starting to creep forward at an estimated 3 mph. The officer jumped off his motorcycle and the Tesla then struck the fallen bike.<\/p>\n

There were no injuries or damage, but the incident renews concerns about the safety of testing and operating autonomous and semi-autonomous vehicles on public roads. Also last week, an Uber pilot vehicle was involved in a multi-car crash in the Phoenix suburbs.<\/p>\n

The most serious incident involving such technology occurred last May, when a former Navy SEAL was killed in a Florida crash involving a Tesla Model S. Federal investigators later ruled Joshua Brown failed to take control of his vehicle when a truck turned in front of it on a Florida highway.<\/p>\n

(To see more about Tesla\u2019s latest lifeline from Wall Street, <\/em><\/strong>Click Here<\/a><\/span><\/strong>.)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Tesla has since said it was going to update its Autopilot system to reduce the risk of using the technology. It is not clear if the vehicle involved in last week\u2019s Phoenix crash had been updated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tencent, one of China\u2019s largest technology investment firms, has taken a 5% stake in the U.S. battery-electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla, but hasn’t said what its plans are yet. Get the story at TheDetroitBureau.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":108359,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"make":[],"post-state":[],"category_old":[151],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114891"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114891"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114891\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108359"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114891"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114891"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114891"},{"taxonomy":"make","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/make?post=114891"},{"taxonomy":"post-state","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post-state?post=114891"},{"taxonomy":"category_old","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/category_old?post=114891"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}