Writing for Arabian Gulf Business Insight, Megha Merani reports that Tesla is set to launch in Saudi Arabia within months.
Having once criticized PIF-backed Lucid for having a ‘Saudi sugar daddy’, Elon Musk’s Tesla will look to enter the Saudi electric vehicle market shortly.
While Tesla’s global sales fell slightly in 2024 with 1,789,226 vehicles sold it remains the largest EV maker in America by far and second only to Chinese company BYD in global sales.
Saudi Arabia’s EV market is nascent and very under-developed. Merani notes that EV penetration is just over 1% of overall car sales in Saudi Arabia and 7% of all vehicle models in the country are electric. Moreover, there were only 104 charging stations nationwide in 2023, according to charging station locator Electromaps.
Nonetheless, the Saudi government has a goal of 30% of vehicles in Riyadh being electric by 2030.
Saudi Arabia is also aggressively pursuing in-country manufacturing (or assembly) of electric vehicles including the Public Investment Fund’s (PIF) majority stake in Lucid Motors which has established an assembly and ultimately a production facility in the King Abdullah Economic Center on the Red Sea.
PIF also has joint venture with Foxconn, Ceer, which plans to begin EV production this year.
Separately, U.S. EV maker Rivian is backed in part by investment arm of Saudi company Abdul Latif Jameel.
According to Merani, Tesla will initiate sales through pop-up stores and ultimately establish a showroom, a service center and roll out a charger network that will be available to all EVs.
She adds that, “Tesla’s expansion into Saudi Arabia could reshape a market characterised by some of the world’s cheapest fuel prices, but also help to increase interest in electric mobility in the kingdom, where the appetite for luxury vehicles is among the highest globally on a per capita basis.”
