Yes, the very first official Tesla electric car has arrived and has found a new owner in Malaysia. Sold through Greentech Malaysia, this grey colour Tesla sedan belongs to a ‘green’ architect and he paid a sensible tax free RM480,000.00 for his ‘green’ sedan.
So what is the running costs of this new Tesla? Road tax is just RM10.00 a year and there is a monthly fee of RM1,400.00 paid to Greentech Malaysia for the next 5 years (60 months) (totally paid RM84,000) which gives the owner free battery charging at all charging stations (but at home he needs to pay his TNB bill) for 5 years at all Greentech installed charging stations.
Greentech Malaysia plans to find 100 Tesla buyers and with the RM1,400.00 signed monthly fee commitment they can set up the infrastructure to maintain the Tesla ownership experience.
Petronas has promised to have a charge station points at all their major Petronas fuel stations in the next 24 months. The charge stations will provide a decent charge in 15 minutes and a full charge will take 1 hour. With a possible drive distance of 420 kilometers, the Tesla owner should have little worry in the first few years and only when the battery starts ‘draining’ the full charge might have a range of less than 350 kilometers.
Please note that the ownership of this Tesla sedan is now and remains with Greentech Malaysia to maintain the tax free status of the Tesla sedan even though the new owner has paid the purchase price in full. After 5 years the new owner can opt to transfer ownership to his name or sell to another and then pay the pro-rated import tax at that time.
After sales and service? No comment at this point as we have not seen a workshop, technical center, computer lab or trained software engineer on 24 hours call for Tesla owners in Malaysia.
Still, it has to start sometime and better now than tomorrow. Welcome pure green driving to Malaysia.
