California truck leasing firm orders 50 Tesla Semis

Truck leasing company Transportation Commodities Inc. (TCI) is the latest company to put down a deposit for the Tesla Semi. TCI announced Wednesday it had reserved 50 electric trucks for delivery when production begins in 2019.

Commerce, Calif.-based TCI joins a list of retailers and transportation providers that have pre-ordered the battery-powered vehicle, with other large orders coming from FedEx Corp., UPS Inc., PepsiCo. Inc., Sysco Corp., and Anheuser-Busch.

TCI will run some of the trucks along routes that fall within the trucks' 300- to 500-mile range, and deliver others to leasing customers that have spoken for some of the units upon arrival, TCI Co-President Andrew Flynn said in a statement on the Tesla blog.

TCI leases trucks from its fleet of more than 2,000 trucks through facilities in five cities in California, as well as in Las Vegas and Phoenix. The company also operates a truckload over-the-road division, and offers truck and trailer sales and maintenance programs for some 1,500 vehicles owned by other companies.

The company announced its order through a Twitter post with a photo of its sibling co-presidents Ryan and Andrew Flynn,posing in front of a Tesla Semi as they prepare for a test drive.

TCI has invested in ordering 50 (YES, 50!!) of the new Tesla Electric Semi trucks!!! Pictured are our very own TCI Co-President's, Ryan and Andrew Flynn - taking this bad boy out for a spin!!! #TeamTCI #Tesla #TeslaElectricSemi #TeslaSemi #TCITransportation pic.twitter.com/bNRekZqMfO

— TCI Transportation (@TCI_Leasing) April 6, 2018

Palo Alto-based Tesla charges a $20,000 deposit to reserve each electric truck, including a $150,000 model with a 300-mile range per battery charge and a $180,000 model with a 500-mile range. Tesla says that both models can be operated at half the cost of diesel vehicles thanks to fuel savings, engine reliability, and driver-assistance features such as automatic emergency braking, adaptive cruise control, automated lane guidance, and vehicle platooning capability.