Tesla CEO Elon Musk says that the company is in the process of completing a “small acquisition” that will help it release its own insurance product, something it said in April that it was only around “a month” away from bringing to market. One month is at least two months when translated from Musk-time to rest-of-us time, so that tracks.
Musk made the remark at Tesla’s Annual Shareholder Meeting, adding that the company is “pretty close to being able to release [its insurance product],” and that in addition to this acquisition in progress, Tesla also has “a bit of software to write” to make it ready for market.
Insurance for Tesla vehicles can be expensive when sourced from traditional insurance providers (it ranked 15th highest in the U.S. in a recent third-party survey), but Tesla says it has a key advantage when compared to third-parties that will help it price insurance for its customers correctly — ample and detailed information about their driving habits.
No word yet on who the acquisition target is, but it makes sense that Apple might seek to pick up a small insurer to supplement its own driving and user data, rather than trying to build an insurance business in-house from scratch.
Source : Tesla completing ‘small acquisition’ which will help launch its insurance product
