Musk: Tesla Motors Will Open its Patents to Everyone

American electric car and powertrain company Tesla Motors announced Thursday that it will open its patents to everyone, according to a report by Jerry Hirsch and Tiffany Hsu in the Los Angeles Times.

The surprising move comes just a year after the public company, traded on the NASDAQ stock market as TSLA, announced for the first time it had turned a profit. The gain in the first quarter of 2013 was very positive for the decade-old company. But Tesla’s stock price tumbled 26 percent in November in the wake of 3 headline-grabbing incidents of Tesla Model S luxury sedans catching fire over a 6-week period in the U.S., as reported by ABC News.

On Thursday, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said, “We think the market is plenty big enough for everyone,” and that “[Tesla’s] true competition is not the small trickle of non-Tesla electric cars being produced, but rather the enormous flood of gasoline cars pouring out of the world’s factories every day.”

Tesla, makers of the Model S and the Tesla Roadster sports car, also designs, builds and sells electric powertrains and lithium-ion battery packs. If more companies begin to manufacture electric cars, the company is expected to continue to sell these components to others.

So would you rent an electric car? Do you think Tesla’s decision is a good move for its business? And will electric cars ever become prominent in your country? Leave a comment to let us know what you think in the Disqus box below!

Jason Dickson is a content writer and a VroomVroomVroom car rental expert. He is willing to review a Tesla Model S, if Tesla would like to give him one.