Elon Musk Admits Tesla ‘Dropped the Ball’ on Model X

Never one to back down from an argument online — and often one to start them — Elon Musk handled a disgruntled Tesla customer surprisingly well on Twitter Wednesday, even calling his company’s decision-making process “idiotic.”

Sawyer Merritt, a Tesla owner and investor, took to the social media platform to air his grievances on the less-than-smooth rollout of Tesla’s recently refreshed Model X.

“Here’s a criticism, the refreshed Model X rollout has been horrible & the lack of communication to customers who have been waiting for a year or more for their car & keep receiving delays is disappointing,” Merritt wrote. “I know the global supply situation is f**ked, but some comm would be nice.”

Though he wasn’t tagged, Musk replied back to Merritt, seemingly regretting the company’s decision to stop production of the vehicle while it worked on the new model.

“We dropped the ball badly regarding new Model X production ramp & still haven’t fully recovered,” the Tesla CEO admitted. “Was idiotic to stop production of old X in Dec 2020 when there was still plenty of demand!”

This past December, Tesla told customers that it was no longer accepting orders for Model X vehicles outside of North America, with deliveries of the vehicle in other markets slated to start the second half of this year.

It has been reported that wait times for Model X vehicles in Europe are more than a year.

The last original Model X was delivered in 2020.

Merritt quipped back at Musk thanking him for his “transparency” and hoped to get some answers from the billionaire as to when delivery times might lessen in length.

Model X is an extremely difficult car to build. Most complex passenger car ever. Limiting factor is interior trim.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 9, 2022

“Any idea when ramp might smoothen out and catch up with demand?” he tweeted at Musk. “I know there’s some stuff not under your control (supply chain issues/shortages for example).”

Musk responded quickly.

“Model X is an extremely difficult car to build,” he explained. “Most complex passenger car ever. Limiting factor is interior trim.”

Tesla, like every other automotive company, has been rocked by supply chain shortages and disruptions due to the pandemic and its related effects.

This was not Musk’s first run-in with Merritt on the social media platform.

Last month, Merritt tweeted out a notice on his account that he would no longer be posting Musk’s travel plans and location and encouraged others to do so too, in the name of the billionaire’s safety.

“Yeah, unfortunately this is becoming a security issue,” Musk seconded.

As of Thursday afternoon, Tesla was up 14% year over year.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/418061