Tesla Cybertruck hailed by some in China as country embraces pickup trucks

Pickup trucks are rising in popularity in China as regulations are relaxed

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The Cybertruck starts at US$39,900, and Chinese consumers can now pre-order it with a deposit of 1,000 yuan (US$142). (Picture: Tesla)

Published: 8:35pm, 22 Nov 2019

This article originally appeared on ABACUS

Unlike Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, whose popularity has been falling in China, many Chinese netizens still love Tesla and its CEO Elon Musk. But Tesla’s newly announced Cybertruck has proven divisive on China’s internet.

Some people are excited about soon being able to drive the company’s electric pickup truck, which is already accepting pre-orders in China.

“I’ve only seen this in Death Race and Mad Max,” one Weibo user said. “This is so cool.”

“When I think that I could drive this thing to and from work before I’m 40 years old, I look forward to the year 2030,” a user on Q&A site Zhihu wrote.

Zhihu, where people in China go to ask questions and get answers

But what some people see as sleek and futuristic, others see as crude and ugly. Netizens are joking that the pickup truck looks like something made by Geng Shuai -- a welder from a village near Beijing who has attracted a large following on short video app Kuaishou with quirky inventions like a smartphone case that doubles as a meat cleaver and a toilet built into a scooter.

Kuaishou is China’s original short-video king, and it now hosts ‘little shops’ and live streaming

“Is this a partnership between Tesla and Geng?” one Weibo user asked, with many similar comments appearing under other posts about Cybertruck.