Source: Master Plan, Part Deux (2016)

• Author: Elon Musk
• Published: 2016-07-20, on Tesla’s website
• Trust tier: verified (Tier 1) — official Tesla text
• Original: tesla.com/master-plan-part-deux

Summary

Ten years after the first plan, Elon Musk opens the sequel by restating the original four-step plan from memory and declaring it “on track” — a deliberate act of holding himself to the earlier public commitment, which is the heart of the The “Secret Master Plan” Method. The 2016 plan then widens Tesla’s scope from cars to an integrated energy company (vehicles + solar + storage), adds autonomy and shared fleets, and reframes the whole effort as answering “the basic question of our time.”

For understanding Musk’s mind, the most revealing passages are not the product specifics but the explicit statement of his two-part business structure — sell a product people want, then redirect that money to the mission — and the closing insistence that “the main motivation of the company is not just to make an awesome car.” It is the same The Sustainable-Energy Mission (and Mission Over Profit) logic as 2006, now stated as a general method.

Key quotes

Restating the original plan from memory, then grading himself against it:

“Basically, we were going to try to accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy. That plan is on track.” 🔗

The two-part business structure — the engine that funds the mission:

“We should have said this explicitly in part one, but the two-part structure of a new business is that you get to make great sales of a product that people want, and you are then able to redirect that money to pursue the mission of the company.” 🔗

The leap to autonomy, with a quantified safety ambition:

“We are currently developing the technology to enable self-driving cars that can be 10x safer than manually driven cars.” 🔗

Why he is building shared autonomy — the explicit reason:

“Let me emphasize this point: autonomous cars can be shared. We believe that owners of Tesla vehicles will be empowered with the option to share their car with a network of other drivers, thus significantly offsetting the monthly loan or lease cost. This is exactly why we’re building the self-driving system.” 🔗

The civilizational framing — the whole company as an answer to one question:

By having a sustainable transportation and energy solutions company, we hope to have answered the basic question of our time, which is: “How do we create a global transport and energy infrastructure that is not reliant on fossil fuels for more than half of a century?” 🔗

The closing statement of motive — mission above product:

“The main motivation of the company is not just to make an awesome car, but to help accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy. That goal is what motivates us all.” 🔗

Connections (pages touched)

• Elon Musk — the author; tracks how his stated strategy evolved from 2006.
• Tesla — scope widened from cars to integrated energy + autonomy.
• The “Secret Master Plan” Method — the act of restating the 2006 plan and grading it “on track.”
• The Sustainable-Energy Mission (and Mission Over Profit) — “accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy”; “not just to make an awesome car.”
• Integrated Ecosystem (Vertical Integration) — the two-part business structure and SolarCity + Tesla integration.
• The Autonomous-Driving Vision (Safety + Shared Fleets) — first formal statement of the self-driving and shared-fleet vision.

See also

• Source: The Secret Tesla Motors Master Plan (2006) — the original four-step plan this sequel reports as “on track.”
• Source: Master Plan Part 3 — Sustainable Energy for All of Earth (2023) — the 2023 whole-planet energy model.
• Source: Tesla Master Plan Part IV (2025) — the 2025 reframe toward AI and “sustainable abundance.”