Elon Musk’s Tesla Model 3 electric vehicle is expected to go into production later this year. Chinese investment holding company Tencent Holdings (which local firm Naspers owns a part of) has bought a 5% stake in Tesla that should help things along.
While 5% doesn’t seem like much, that slice of the electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer set Tencent back around $1.78 billion (~R23 billion), and according to the BBC, this stake doesn’t even give Tencent a say in how the firm is run.
Tencent also has investments in a number of other transport-focused firms, including Uber rival Lyft.
Tesla isn’t even the company’s first foray into the EV market. In July 2016 Tencent invested an undisclosed amount in Future Mobility, a firm which hopes to have a self-driving EV on the road by 2020.
This investment does, however, make Tencent Tesla’s fifth-largest shareholder behind Elon Musk himself, Fidelity, Baillie Gifford and T Rowe Price.
The Model 3 is the next big thing from the manufacturer, and is meant to be Tesla’s “affordable” model with a price tag of $35 000 (~R460 000).
The car is currently available for pre-order on Tesla’s website, but orders are only expected to be fulfilled in 2018.
[Via – BBC]
