Hyunjoo Jin Exclusive -- Jim Farley Getting Read To Open The Champagne -- January 14, 2022

Biggest story so far today that won't get much press: Tesla delays CyberTruck rollout. Won't be available in 2022 as promised; now, earliest, sometime in 2023. 

Hyunjoo Jin has an exclusive: Tesla will delay initial production of its Cybertruck to early 2023. And even that looks questionable. Link here.  Oh, Tesla might roll out "a" Cybertruck in early 2023 but it won't look a bit like the one in the video below.

Think about that.

2022. 2023.

We're barely into 2022. We have essentially a full year of 2022 left. 

Elon Musk blames supply chain shortages but wasn't the CyberTruck unveiled in November, 2019 -- more than two years ago? Ford faced the same supply chain shortages -- one can argue Ford had worse challenges -- and Ford has already released the Lightning F-150. It seems Tesla has been working on EVs for a decade or more, and it's only working on EVs. 

Ford, meanwhile, has a few other things to complicate the lives of their employees -- and, seemingly, out of nowhere, Ford has a winner of an EV pickup truck. 

My hunch: this had less to do with supply chain shortages and more to do with a complete re-design. Not only is the superficial design a joke, is there a box? I mean a box that can actually carry something. So, we'll see. 

Apparently American pick-up buyers were not ready for this ...

... or this:

Looking back on this: does anyone really believe this truck will be available for less than $40,000?

Oh, I get it. The more-expensive truck will have stronger windows.

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So, Where Is This All Going?

From 79,000 feet this is how the EV market will play out in North America:

Sedans:

• Chevy Bolt, #1 for the average American.
• Apple: #1 for the elite.
  
• Mercedes-Benz to assemble flagship electric sedan in India.
• the most high-tech car on the road: Mercedes' EQS, the electric S-Class and may be the shape of things to come.
• about the same price as the high end Ford Lightning.
  

SUVs:

• TBD. White House, Algore, Hillary, Trump, Bezos, will have luxury-brand SUVs
• Ford, possibly #1 by putting a SUV body on top of a Lightning chassis.
  

Pick-ups: Ford, #1.

Fleet delivery vans:

• Ford. #1 among second-tier retailers, Walmart, Target.
  
• Daimler Truck Group: #1 among the elite retailers.

Medium haul: Daimler Truck Group, #1.

Long haul: Daimler Truck Group, #1. 

Specialty, heavy-duty: Daimler Truck Group, #1.