Literature Review
Literature Review
Literature Review
Justin Creamer
Eng. 1201
Prof. Cook
3-11-2021
Literature Review
Over the past 6 years, Tesla has seen great changes in their sales numbers, and for good
reason. Teslas of today offer features ranging from autopilot, Tesla's self driving/ self parking
feature, to a 17” screen allowing for navigation, music, gaming, and more. Most notably,
Tesla's auto-pilot feature is leading the world in self driving capabilities and will likely be the
first company to develop a full autonomous vehicle. This leaves a problem for other car
companies, because if they want to be able to keep up with the times then they must begin work
on autonomous vehicles. The question that needs to be answered is why Tesla’s cars are so
sought after and what other car manufacturers are doing to not fall too far behind.
The history behind Tesla becoming the front runner in fully electric and fully automated
cars is short. The company was founded in 2003 by two entrepreneurs and named the company
after Serbian inventor, Nikola Tesla. Tesla was formed to develop electric sports cars. Funding
for the company was most notably obtained from Elon Musk, a co-founder of PayPal. Musk
became chairman of the company in 2004. In 2008 Tesla released its first fully electric
“Roadster” and it achieved ranges unprecedented for the electric car industry. The Roadsters
price was set at $109,000 making it a luxury item. The two founders who were residing as CEO
and President, left the company in 2008. Musk took over as CEO after their resignations. In
2012 Tesla stopped production on the Roadster and concentrated on it’s Model S sedan.
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Acclaimed for its performance and design, the Model S had increased ranges and quicker
acceleration than its predecessor. In 2014 the first version of semi autonomous vehicles became
available on the Model S. Two years prior, Tesla built charging stations across the United States
and Europe allowing for charging at no extra charge. In 2015, Tesla released the Model X, a
crossover vehicle with features of a sport utility vehicle but built on a car chassis. Due to
demand, in 2017, Tesla began production on a cheaper 4 day sedan with a price of $35,000. The
company also branched out into solar energy products for homes and businesses in 2015. They
changed their name to “Tesla Inc.” as they no longer just sold cars. (Shreiber).
Currently Tesla has one big advantage of it’s electric vehicles over other company’s, and
that’s range. The range on the Model 3, Tesla's cheapest vehicle, is up to 250 miles. However
most of the company’s cars can get over 300 miles on a single charge. Boudette, writer at New
York Times, compares these numbers to those of other company’s. “The maximum for the
E-tron and Taycan is about 200 miles. The I-Pace and Bolt go about 235 to 260 miles”. The
E-tron is an Audi manufactured vehicle, Taycan is a Porsche manufactured vehicle. The I-Pace
and Bolt are Jaguar and Chevrolet manufactured respectively (Boudette). This New York Times
article appears to be reliable as New York Times is a respected publisher. This article has also
been consistently updated over the past 8 months, continuing to add new information. This
article is written towards a more casual reader compared to some other sources. It refrains from
going into great detail about Tesla vehicles and makes what it’s saying easy to understand.
Not only is Tesla fully electric, but it also has many self-driving capabilities that other
manufacturers haven’t added to their vehicles. Tesla's Autopilot features include: Traffic Aware
Cruise Control, which matches your speed to that of the surrounding traffic. And Autosteer
which assists in steering within a clearly marked lane. Tesla’s Full Self-Driving Capabilities
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include: Navigate on Autopilot, which makes all interstate driving autonomous, Auto Lane
Change, Auto Park, Summon, Smart Summon, and Traffic and Stop Sign Control. An upcoming
capability is Auto Steering on city streets. (Tesla). This source is written by Tesla’s Autopilot
team so it would be difficult to find a source more reliable. Tesla is labeled as the chief
innovator of the self-driving car market, a goal of Elon Musks when he took over the company.
The company began including self-driving features in its cars in 2014 such as auto steering in a
marked lane. In 2016 Tesla announced that all of it’s vehicles would include hardware that was
capable of full self-driving capabilities, though the software necessary would be withheld until it
was fully developed. (Biscontini). This source is labeled as a “Research Starter” on the
Sinclair Database and has over 15 sources cited, making it a very reliable source.
Software Updates are another huge part of Tesla cars that other manufacturers don’t
include. These software updates compare to updates that a smartphone would receive. Very
quick, even sometimes without even knowing, and no need to go to a dealership or shop
(Boudette). This software updatability is a very important feature of Tesla’s. “This capability
drew attention in 2018, after Tesla rapidly released an update to the Model 3's braking algorithm
in response to criticism from Consumer Reports. The fix led Consumer Reports to reevaluate the
car and subsequently change its verdict from not recommended to recommended.” As
previously mentioned, this ability was used to delay the self-driving ability of Tesla’s in 2016 to
2017 (Biscontini).
As we move farther into the twenty-first century data continues to take over our lives in
almost every way. Teslas are able to use your data it takes from driving tendencies and learns to
adapt to your driving habits. It also uses similar software that apps such as Google Maps use in
order to calculate the fastest route and to recognize any traffic or other interruptions. As Howard
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Tullman says in his article The Future of the Auto Industry Is Data. Which Means Tesla Has
Already Won. “Data never dies”. Meaning that even as we continue to adapt to as a society, our
The question in the air is why is Tesla the future of automobiles and what are other
manufactures doing to stay in the race? It is clear why Tesla is labeled the “future”. From their
high range on an electric charge, leading self-driving and autopilot capabilities, regular software
updates to all of their vehicles, and use of data to help improve your driving, Tesla’s lead the
competition in almost every aspect of electric vehicles. Further research needs to be done to
determine what other manufactures are doing, it appeared that some companies were dabbling in
electric vehicles, but were doing nothing to compete with the other Tesla features.
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Work Cited
Biscontini, Tyler. “Tesla Inc.” Research Starters, Salem Press Encyclopedia, 2021,
eds-b-ebscohost-com.sinclair.ohionet.org/eds/detail/detail?vid=5&sid=4d1f7caa-a
110-41fc-beb9-aea3d40356d6%40sessionmgr4007&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWRzLW
xpdmU%3d#AN=100259322&db=ers.
Boudette, Neal E. “In the Electric Car Market, It's Tesla and a Jumbled Field of
Also-Rans.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 22 July 2020,
www.nytimes.com/2020/07/22/business/tesla-electric-car-audi-polestar.html.
Tullman, Howard. “The Future of the Auto Industry Is Data. Which Means Tesla Has