Tesla October Surprise: Is It Date With A Model?

By DONNA HOWELL, INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY

Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk cryptically tweeted on Twitter "About time to unveil the D and something else" and at last count got 11,000 retweets, as everyone from electric-car enthusiasts to investors (and the overlap) speculated that a new model from the luxury e-car maker is in the offing.

Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) stock drove to a 4.7% gain in the stock market today, on a day the Nasdaq rose just a fraction.
The message posted late Wednesday came with a picture of a roll-up garage door emblazoned with a "D" and peeking out from under it part of a black car. At first glance it looks similar to the Model S sedan that Tesla makes now. And with it were the words "October 9, 2014" and "Tesla."

Tesla's known plans have been to build a Model X crossover SUV for release next year, and sometime after that a smaller and more affordable vehicle that could compete with the likes of the BMW 3 series sedans.

But a Model D? Unheard of.

It might not be a new model. Musk later tweeted, "Glad I didn't mention the other letter!" after saying "I love the Internet. Comments had me literally ROFL" — that is, rolling on floor laughing.

D plus another letter could stand for Driver Assist, one possibility the Tesla-tuned public has suggested.

Like General Motors (NYSE:GM) and many other automakers, Tesla is a partner with Mobileye (NYSE:MBLY), a recent IPO whose stock has doubled amid demand for its advanced driver-assistance system technology. Its ADAS helps drivers stay in lanes and one day could help guide cars that drive themselves.

Tesla has been working on its car software systems recently. In September, it issued an over-the-air update for the software that runs in a Model S. The newly released Version 6 software lets owners start up their cars remotely from a smartphone by entering a password in the carmaker's Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) iPhone or Google (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Android smartphone app.

It also "introduces traffic-based navigation and commute advice, provides an in-car view of daily schedules, enables location-based air-suspension settings and allows owners to name their Model S," Tesla said in a recent press release.

On what the "D" could entail, another suggestion was possibly a diesel model, but that sounds unlikely given Tesla's commitment to the electric car industry and that it's building a multibillion-dollar battery factory in Nevada.

Now if the announcement is that future Teslas could run on conventional D batteries, that would be news. But they won't, whatever Tesla's D-ticket ride may be.

Culled from: http://news.investors.com