Tesla Cybertruck will arrive in 2023, at the earliest

Days before Tesla's earnings call last week, photos and video of a new Cybertruck prototype made the rounds on social media, offering hope for a 2022 launch.

The prototype images, which first appeared on the Cybertruck Owners Club blog, showed the wildly styled pickup with a windshield wiper and side mirrors not present on the 2019 concept, suggesting progress toward production.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk played into the hype prior to the earnings call, where he planned to present a highly anticipated product update.

"Been driving latest Cybertruck prototype around Giga Texas," Musk wrote on Twitter, referring to the automaker's new Austin factory. "It's awesome!"

But just minutes into his presentation the next day, Musk dropped the hammer: "So, we will not be introducing new vehicle models this year," he said, citing the semiconductor shortage, among other reasons. The Cybertruck, he said, would "hopefully" be ready for launch in 2023.

The unpainted, stainless-steel Cybertruck is considered a key Tesla product for shoppers in the massive pickup segment who want to go electric. It's also a potential rival to Ford's F-150 Lightning on sale this spring, along with the Rivian R1T already on sale and the Chevrolet Silverado EV slated for 2023.

Instead, Musk said, the company is focused on increasing production and sales, which rose 87 percent last year to just more than 936,000 vehicles globally. Deliveries are slated to rise by more than half this year, he said, as Tesla doubles its factory capacity.

"There is a lot of new technology in the Cybertruck that will take some time to work through," Musk said. "And there is the question of what is the average cost of Cybertruck and to what degree that is affordable."

Cybertruck volume should reach 250,000 per year, "but it will take a moment to get to that level," he said.

Musk's muted product road map was a sour note amid record 2021 sales and profits, the near-completion of factories in Texas and Berlin and deployment of a new battery cell in the Model Y crossover that will increase vehicle range and reduce costs over time. The Model Y in 2020 was Tesla's last vehicle launch.

"Musk's reputation for making splashy announcements might have set expectations a bit high for Teslaphiles, who are likely a bit disappointed at the company's pared-back product road map," said Jessica Caldwell, executive director of insights at Edmunds.

"It seems a bit uncharacteristic of Musk to choose a more pragmatic approach over an attention-grabbing one, but Musk's decision to focus on the vehicles that Tesla is already producing makes sense. Demand for Tesla's existing products remains high, and the microchip crunch and supply chain issues aren't going away any time soon," Caldwell said.

Musk also shot down near-term development of a $25,000 electric car, which he suggested during a "Battery Day" presentation in 2020. Musk had said the inexpensive EV could be ready by 2023. Musk is known for his optimistic timelines for future products, which are often delayed.

"We are not currently working on a $25,000 car," Musk said last week in response to a question on the earnings call. "At some point we will. But we have enough on our plate right now — too much on our plate, frankly."

He also suggested future robotaxis would be a better form of low-cost transportation.

Nevertheless, Tesla continues engineering and planning work on the Cybertruck, the Tesla Semi cargo truck, the long-delayed Roadster coupe and a Tesla robot called Optimus, Musk said.

"I think actually the most important product development we're doing this year is actually the Optimus humanoid robot," Musk said. "This, I think, has the potential to be more significant than the vehicle business over time."

Another critical goal for Tesla, Musk said, was rapid development of the automaker's "Full Self-Driving" software now in beta form. About  60,000 Tesla owners have downloaded the Full Self-Driving beta software as the company moves toward autonomous vehicles such as robotaxis, Tesla said in its earnings report.

Currently, Tesla's Full Self-Driving system cannot operate on its own. Drivers who paid up to $12,000 for the software are responsible for operating their vehicles. Critics say the software, along with Tesla's camera-based hardware, may never be fully autonomous because of the technical complexity.

Musk, on the other hand, thinks Full Self-Driving is potentially Tesla's biggest profit center as it would radically transform personal transportation and reduce the need for private vehicle ownership.

"I would be shocked if we do not achieve full self-driving safer than a human this year," he said on the conference call. "I would be shocked."