News

Deliveries Of Tesla’s Futuristic Cybertruck Have Begun

Elon Musk personally handed over the first vehicle at a delivery event in Austin, Texas. Tesla also revealed the price and specifications of its latest load-hauling EV.

Published

3 years ago

December 1, 2023

Nour Nasir

Tesla

Two years after Tesla was due to deliver its first EV pickups, the Cybertruck is finally here. The base model of the load-lugging EV will cost $61,000 — around $21,000 more than CEO Elon Musk promised when the vehicle was announced four years ago.

Deliveries to reservation holders began during a stage event in Austin, Texas, with Musk himself in attendance. Tesla’s website says that two more versions of the Cybertruck will follow next year, including an all-wheel drive model (around $80,000) and a premium model known as the “Cyberbeast” (around $100,000).

Feat of Strength 3: Cyberbeast (0-60 in 2.6s) pic.twitter.com/q0cK9zb21D

— Tesla (@Tesla) November 30, 2023

Base model Cybertrucks can travel 250 miles on a single charge, while the premium Cyberbeast can reach 320 miles. The base model, which won’t be delivered in large volumes until 2025, has a single motor that drives the rear wheels and a 0-to-60 time of 6.5 seconds. The all-wheel drive middle model, available next year, reduces that figure to 4.1 seconds. Finally, the premium version, due in 2024, will be able to reach a top speed of 130 mph and go from 0 to 60 in 2.6 seconds. Towing capacities are rated at a massive 5,000 kg.

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The Cybertruck is a huge deal for Tesla. It’s the first new vehicle the EV maker has produced in three years. Tesla ran into two years of delays during production, primarily due to the vehicle’s unorthodox design and heavy use of stainless steel.

During the Austin, Texas event, Musk exclaimed: “We have a car here that experts said was impossible. Finally, the future will look like the future”.

Related Topics:Automotive Elon Musk Tesla

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Visa’s Return To Syria Starts With A Test And A Bank In Lebanon

Foreign visitors will be the first users to benefit, but whether Syria’s own banks and cardholders follow is still an open question.

Published

2 days ago

August 27, 2026

Dana Saadeh

visa's return to syria starts with a test and a bank in lebanon

Visa is returning to Syria. Its first live international card transaction in the country was a test rather than a launch, and the milestone event ran through a Lebanese bank.

The acquirer (the bank on the merchant’s side of a card payment) was Fransabank Lebanon, with Paymera as the other named partner. Nadim Moujaes, who heads a Fransabank Group subsidiary, describes the test as both the culmination of “longstanding efforts to link Syria back to international payment networks” and “the first step in a larger path”.

Syrian President Ahmed Al-Sharaa makes the first electronic payment in Syria using a @Visa card at a store in Damascus, following the lifting of US sanctions on Syria. pic.twitter.com/lpAN7nQ6Fc

— Tech Magazine (@TechMGZN) August 27, 2026

“We are excited to have successfully tested live transactions today as we plan to enable international visitors to use their Visa cards while in Syria,” says Leila Serhan, Visa’s senior vice president and group country manager for the North Africa, Levant and Pakistan region. Although a significant first step, that plan doesn’t come with a hard date for when a visitor’s card will work normally.

Mohammed Safwat Raslan, governor of the Central Bank of Syria, says the test paves the way for international card acceptance in Syria and that maintaining strong compliance, risk management and operational controls will remain essential. Serhan likewise stresses that Visa has worked within applicable legal, regulatory and compliance requirements. For a test transaction, it seems there was a great deal of attention paid to the rules, with the entire operation being carefully managed.

Also Read: Lebanon’s 5G Era Begins With 150 Stations And A $1M Budget

The test is the latest step in a sequence that began in December 2025, when Visa announced a strategic roadmap to support Syria’s integration into the global digital economy. In February 2026 it hosted its first industry gathering of banks, ecosystem partners and policymakers in Damascus and, the same month, signed an agreement with Syria’s Ministry of Communications and Information Technology in San Francisco.

Michel Kattouah, Paymera’s CEO, called the test “the return of international card acceptance,” but while that’s positive news, there’s no word yet on when a Syrian bank will issue a Visa card to a Syrian customer.