Tesla may resume New Jersey sales after ban on direct marketing goes

A new bill in New Jersey could see the ban on direct-to-customer sales in the state lifted. After governor Chris Christie helped the Motor Vehicle Commission stymie the move for electric cars over two months ago, NJ.com reported that a review committee had worked a way around the decades-old law.

Currently car makers are required to sell cars to consumers only through auto dealers.

In an unanimous vote, the state's Assembly Consumer Affairs Committee passed a bill that would give Tesla not only the right to resume sales in its two existing New Jersey showrooms, but also allow it to open two more.

According to commentators this comes as huge win for electric car makers in general, as it allowed any company to sell zero-emission vehicles directly to customers to open up to four stores in the Garden State.

The development puts the 1970 law requiring sale of cars through dealerships on notice, but there would also be calls for the state to better protect the dealer "status quo."

The FTC had already said such amendments hurt competition, but it did not have any real power to enact change and would have to rely on lawmakers, like those in New Jersey, to restore the sales rights Tesla believed it deserved.

The bill would need to pass a few more of New Jersey's legislative processes to become law, but things were generally looking up for Tesla.

Meanwhile with a breakthrough in battery technology reported every other day, Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk remains unimpressed and unfazed by these reports. However, the company's upcoming battery Gigafactory would be ready should one of these battery breakthroughs did materialise.

Responding to a question whether Tesla was worried about a battery breakthrough coming from elsewhere in the industry, Musk said that so far, none of the supposed breakthroughs had held up at a laboratory level or actually exceed Tesla's own composition.

As regards the Gigafactory, in the event one of these breakthroughs happened, it would be relatively simple to retool the factory to utilise the new anode or cathode, where most battery research was focused. In fact, he expected ''…to evolve the anode and cathode. It's not merely, 'What if that happens.' We expect that to happen.''

Commentators interpret the remarks to indicate that Musk and Tesla had their sights focused well into the future, and would not be caught by surprise if a battery breakthrough inevitably happened.

(Also see: Electric car maker Tesla to raise $1.6 bn to fund battery plant)