Tesla Motors Applies To Sell, Service Vehicles In MI

The scale the company needs will come both from Tesla’s strategy – develop as many vehicles as possible from shared platforms, to enable them to be sold at a price that’s competitive with cheap, gas-powered cars – and the innate simplicity of electric cars.

“In Recent Weeks”: While the exact date was undisclosed, Tesla and the Michigan Secretary of State Office confirmed that “follow-up” information was submitted from Tesla to the State regarding the application.

Secretary of state spokesman Fred Woodhams says the department is reviewing applications to sell new and used cars and a decision is expected “in the next month or two”.

Morgan Stanley’s Adam Jonas, a known Tesla Motors Inc. bull, seems to be losing the faith, at least a little bit.

Tesla’s fight to sell cars directly has spanned several years, leading to high drama in a number of states like Texas, New Jersey, and MI, among others.

“As recently amended, current MI law prohibits Tesla from being able to license its own sales and service operations in the state”, said Tesla. The move was criticized by Tesla, which sells directly to customers. “Tesla will take all appropriate steps to fix this broken situation”. Korea Investment CORP boosted its stake in Tesla Motors by 6.0% in the fourth quarter.

This news comes via Autoblog which along with The Detroit News received a reply from Tesla in regard to a November 2015 application for a Class A dealership license which would involved a full sales and service traditional style dealership.

Consequently, the direct distribution debate isn’t expected to wind down anytime soon.

Tesla owns all of its own dealerships, unlike General Motors, Ford and Fiat Chrysler and all the foreign automakers. Maron also encouraged listeners to think about the way new technology catches on and is distributed.

As for what’s next for the company in MI, we will just have to wait and see, but the automaker certainly hasn’t pulled out of the state completely after Gov. Rick Snyder’s 2014 ruling on its direct distribution model. As a result, he has lowered his volume assumption for the vehicle, and his new unit number for 2020 is less than half of the 500,000 vehicles Tesla management is targeting.

Editor’s Note: Stay tuned to Auto Remarketing Today for more industry insight on Tesla’s pending dealership license application in MI.