The erstwhile and undisputed co-founder of Weblogs Inc. (parent of this here site), Jason Calacanis, revealed some time ago that he had placed an order for a Tesla Roadster. At the time he had missed out on the opportunity to purchase one of the first 100 Signature series cars. Those are the cars that come after the 25 Founders series cars. The buyers of the Signature series cars had to pay up in full in advance. Following Jason's recent opportunity to borrow Chairman Elon Musk's #1 Roadster, Jason evidently decided he couldn't wait until 2009. Fortunately for Jason, venture capitalist Ray Lane gave up his spot in the sequence since Lane's firm, Kleiner Perkins, is an investor in rival start up Fisker Automotive. Tesla offered Lane's slot to Calacanis, who obviously grabbed the opportunity. According to Tesla VP Darryl Siry, a couple of other signature series slots have changed hands including one that was recently snapped up by Matt Damon.

Calacanis is scheduled to get car #16 in the signature series which is #41 overall. According to Siry, the switchover to the new powertrain is now scheduled to occur at around car #38, so Jason's car should come properly equipped and shouldn't require an upgrade. Since departing from Weblogs Inc. Jason has also done some venture capital work with Sequioa Capital and started another new company called Mahalo. Mahalo is described as a human powered search engine that uses an editorial staff to create a directory of what they consider the best of the web. Once he does get his Roadster, Jason is considering actually giving it away on Mahalo as a promotion for the site. Stay tuned for more info on that.

[Source: Jason Calacanis]

Just as TTAC has finally put down their Tesla Birthwatch series and the first actual customer car has been delivered, the EV manufacturer has seen fit to update their customers on plans for the rest of the year. Although the car with serial number 2 destined for company founder Martin Eberhard started down the assembly line on March 17 of this year, only cars 3 and 4 have actually left the factory to date. According to the update letter from Marketing VP Darryl Siry, the factory is preparing to start assembly on cars 6 and 7. Tesla announced earlier in the year that initial production would be very slow as they stamp out bugs in the process. According to the schedule in the letter, the first couple of dozen Founders Series cars should be done by the end of June. After that the Signature 100 cars will be built for those customers that paid full price up front with that batch done by October. After that production really ramps up with the 600 2008 models expected to be complete by about April 2009.

Perhaps more important is the update on the new powertrain. Apparently the new power electronics module is going through durability testing right now. With the 850A current level the motor is putting out about 280lb-ft of torque and pushing the Roadster to 60mph in the original 3.9sec. A running change to the new hardware should take place sometime in September with vehicle 40 or so. The cars built prior to that will get free upgrades to the new hardware. The letter also clarifies the warranty at 3 years/36,000 miles although a 4 year/50,000 mile will be available at extra cost. Tesla had planned to charge an upfront fee of $8,000 that would cover the cost of shipping vehicles to a service center if the customer lived more than 100 miles from a Tesla Store. That has now been dropped in favor of a pay as you go scheme. As for those stores, the LA outlet is now open with a Menlo Park store opening this summer and New York in the fall. In the first quarter of '09 Chicago, Miami and Seattle outlets should debut. In addition Tesla plans to open satellite service centers in major cities over the next two years. If you aren't already on the list a 2009 Roadster will now set you back a minimum of $109,000 while a fully loaded example will run $120,200.

[Source: Tesla Motors]