No, a Volkswagen-Tesla Deal Is Not Happening

You have no doubt seen videos of Elon Musk riding around with Volkswagen CEO Hebert Diess and VW’s new ID.3. But while theories have run wild about any possible implications this may have a possible Volkswagen-Tesla deal, Diess has quelled the masses and stated that no such dealings were happening.

Elon Musk has been on a little tour of Germany as construction of the company’s newest Berlin Gigafactory has been going underway. Along his globetrotting adventures, Musk took a surprising stop to see Diess and a few of his upcoming electric cars at a German airport.

Following the meeting, Diess posted a short video of him and Musk taking a ride in the ID.3 up and down the airport runway. The video includes snippets of their conversation inside the car as Diess answers questions that Musk has about the electric car. Musk even gave a compliment stating that “for a non-sporty car it’s pretty good.”

Of course, while the exchange between the two seemed nothing more than just a friendly ‘hey I’m in the area, maybe I could swing by’, theories had already started to circulate about some sort of possible dealings going on between the two automakers. Two chief executives can’t just meet up without a pretense of business arrangments, right?

Tesla has previously collaborated in the past with Daimler and Toyota (although both were much earlier in Tesla’s life), so the thought of cooperation between other automakers is not completely unfounded.

However, six hours after posting the video to his personal Linkedin Diess had found it necessary to comment on the post to confirm that nothing was going on.

Just to be clear: We just drove the ID.3 and had a chat – there is no deal/cooperation in the making.

I’m sure that there are still some people that think that the chat could be a precursor for a future deal sometime in the future, and you can’t really rule that out. Though Tesla is no longer in the dire situation it was years ago when they were on the verge of bankruptcy, so there might not be too much benefit for them unless the two of them can collaborate on a segment that neither of them currently has a vehicle for.

What do you guys think, was this just a friendly chat/checkup, or will there really be some sort of deal coming in the future between the two companies?