Comment Amid all of the glitzy, high-dollar press conferences about groundbreaking new cars and technology at CES 2025, leave it to Tesla to quietly drop updates to the world's best-selling car on its Chinese website with zero fanfare. Yes, the Tesla Model Y Juniper is finally here. And it is simultaneously both extremely important to Tesla and the global EV scene, and a bit passé. Whether it can revive Tesla's sales fortunes is the subject of this Friday edition of Critical Materials, our morning news roundup about tech and the auto industry. Also on deck as we close out a busy week: how cars stole the show at CES, and a look at whether the auto industry can grow in 2025. Let's dig in. Get the best news, reviews, columns, and more delivered straight to your inbox. Photo by: Tesla Well, that was unexpected. (Kind of.) Tesla's updated Model Y "Juniper" refresh went live on its Chinese website Thursday evening with zero announcements from the automaker. Just like the updated "Highland" Model 3 in 2023, Tesla did this because it will head to China—its most important global market—first, followed by the U.S. and Europe. There's no timeline on when that will happen, and Tesla CEO Elon Musk spent the evening posting about "woke" firefighters, Germany's AfD party and "defunding" the Sierra Club. Oh well. I bring that up here because it does illustrate the challenges facing Tesla right now: declining sales, a lack of focus on its core product (selling cars) and continual allegations that the man up top—whose very presence at Tesla is the key driver of its value to Wall Street—is distracted by his countless other ventures, which now include global politics. We know Tesla encountered its first sales decline in a dozen years in 2024. While the Cybertruck received a ton of initial hype, even years of it, there are signs that demand is cooling off hard. And the updated Tesla Model 3 has many good improvements, but at the end of the day, it's a sedan in an SUV world. So is this new Model Y good enough to fend off newer and even better electric competitors? Here's the lay of the land from CNBC, a few days ago before the Juniper debuted: The U.S. electric vehicle maker saw annual sales in China jump 8.8% to a record high of more than 657,000 cars in 2024. In December alone, its sales rose 12.8% from the previous month to 83,000 units, according to Tesla China. However, Tesla has been losing market share to Chinese new-energy-vehicle players, down from 7.8% in 2023 to 6% in the January to November period last year, according to Bill Russo, founder and CEO of Automobility, who believes Tesla is “struggling to keep pace [with domestic rivals] and has a limited and aging product portfolio.” Brand resiliency and price cuts have supported Tesla’s sales so far, said Tu Le, founder and managing director of Sino Auto Insights, but he was less certain that Tesla could keep up its momentum in 2025, given the lack of new products and increased local competition, especially from Chinese companies. It's one problem in the U.S. market, for example, when the Model Y faces competition from interesting new players like the Chevy Equinox EV or updated Hyundai Ioniq 5 (which now comes with a Tesla-style NACS plug too.) It's another problem, a bigger one, in China. There, Tesla has been coasting on brand strength and price cuts for years now—relying on its ability to undercut competitors to juice sales, albeit at the expense of profits and revenue. More from CNBC: Its best-selling Model Y now starts at 239,900 yuan after the discount, while the Model 3 sedan starts at 231,900 yuan — Tesla had cut its prices by 14,000 yuan in April — according to its website. Still that marked a significant premium over a swath of cheaper models offered by Chinese domestic carmakers. BYD, which dominated the market with around 34% market share, prices one of its best-selling models Seagull at 136,800 yuan, and the more affordable Yuan Plus model, starting at 96,800 yuan. As the price war extends into the new year, Li Auto introduced cash subsidies of 15,000 yuan per purchase along with a three-year zero-interest financing scheme, according to a post last Thursday on its social media Weibo account. Nio also extended a similar three-year zero-interest loan plan for its EV buyers. I actually like the way the new Model Y looks. And I spent a week over the holidays in an updated Model 3, which you'll read about here soon; I liked it a lot, even if it's not sure if it wants to be a BMW 3 Series or a Toyota Corolla. I'm sure the Model Y's updates will be welcome. But are those updates enough to fend off BYD and Zeekr and Nio and Xpeng and the rest? And even Chevy and Hyundai here in America? It's got its work cut out, that's for sure. 60%: Cars Stole The Show At CES 2025 Sony-Honda Afeela 1 CES 2025 Photo by: Honda UK Meanwhile, lots of people I spoke to in Las Vegas this week went into it saying that CES wouldn't be a very big deal on the automotive front this year. Bunk! Cars were everywhere at CES. I've never been more convinced—not that I needed it—that the tech industry sees your car as the next great platform for streaming apps, groundbreaking hardware and software and subscription services. (Whether you like it or not.) Besides the big news we covered from BMW, Honda, Afeela, Toyota, the Chinese automakers and more, there was the tech side of things too.