Musk in China: Between the Cult of an Innovator and the Risk of Security

Elon Musk has long existed in China in two forms. For part of the public, he is a “global idol,” an entrepreneur who made electric vehicles, rockets and robots part of the everyday imagination of the future. For the state, he is a useful but dangerous partner whose empire reaches into areas of strategic security.

His appearance in Beijing alongside Donald Trump, Tim Cook, Jensen Huang and other American corporate leaders was more than a business delegation detail. Musk arrived in a country that helped turn Tesla into a global manufacturer — and is now itself threatening Tesla’s status.

Chinese social media quickly seized on a symbolic moment: before the ceremony at the Great Hall of the People, Musk was seen turning in place with a phone in his hand, apparently filming the surroundings. The clip went viral. It contained something characteristic of his Chinese image: technical curiosity, theatrical instinct and a willingness to become part of the spectacle.

For Daycom, the episode matters because it reveals a new kind of relationship between China and American technology magnates. Beijing is no longer simply opening its market to a powerful foreign brand. It is assessing each such partner as part of a wider system of risks, dependencies and industrial competition.

Tesla remains one of the most successful examples of an American company entering the Chinese economy. In 2018, it became the first foreign automaker allowed to build cars in China without a local partner. The Shanghai factory quickly became one of the pillars of Musk’s global industrial model.

Last year, Tesla sold about 626,000 vehicles in China and remained among the largest players in the market for electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids. China accounted for roughly a fifth of the company’s revenue. For Musk, this is not a peripheral business line but one of the centers of his industrial architecture.

Yet China is now where Tesla can see most clearly how quickly a student can catch up with the teacher. BYD, Chery, Geely, XPeng, Nio and other Chinese automakers are pressing Tesla on price, model-renewal speed, local supply chains and increasingly confident software.

Chinese companies spent years studying Tesla as a benchmark: batteries, software logic, vertical integration, minimalist interiors and over-the-air updates. But imitation has gradually turned into competition. What was once Musk’s advantage has become training material for his future rivals.

Even so, Tesla still retains strong technological authority in China. Its approach to autonomous driving remains an important reference point for the industry, and Full Self-Driving is one of the key assets for which the company is seeking broader regulatory room. For Beijing, this is both an opportunity and a challenge.

China is interested in technologies that overlap almost perfectly with its own priorities: electric vehicles, artificial intelligence, autonomous driving, humanoid robots, satellite systems, brain-computer interfaces and solar energy. Few foreign entrepreneurs intersect so precisely with China’s vision of future industry.

But that breadth is exactly what makes Musk problematic. He is not merely the head of Tesla. He controls SpaceX, Starlink, X and projects in robotics, AI and energy. For China, such a businessman is not only an investor but an infrastructure node capable of influencing transport, information, communications and military resilience.

Starlink has become the most sensitive element. Its role in Russia’s war against Ukraine showed that a private satellite network can acquire near-state significance. For China’s People’s Liberation Army, that is not a technical story but a warning: in a potential crisis in Asia, such a system could become part of America’s advantage.

That is why the Chinese state sees Musk differently from his Chinese fans. On Weibo, he may be praised as a pioneer, called “Brother Ma” and admired for his energy; even his mother has become a recognizable public figure. But in security offices, his companies are read through other categories: data, cameras, satellites, communications and control.

This has already had practical consequences. In 2021, Tesla vehicles were restricted from entering military compounds because of concerns over cameras and data collection. Only after further assurances and compliance reviews were those restrictions eased. Trust did not simply exist; it had to be rebuilt.

Another blow to Tesla’s reputation came through customer-complaint scandals. A protest by a Tesla owner at the Shanghai auto show, where she accused the company of mishandling a braking complaint, turned into a viral episode and forced Tesla to apologize publicly. For China, it was a reminder that even a cult brand must submit to local public discipline.

Musk has learned to maneuver. He rarely allows himself sharp political gestures toward China, repeatedly stresses the importance of the Chinese market, acknowledges the strength of local manufacturers and behaves far more cautiously here than in many other public arenas. His business empire depends too heavily on Chinese factories, suppliers and buyers.

The present moment is especially difficult for him. Tesla is seeking broader approval for Full Self-Driving, Musk is looking to buy equipment from Chinese suppliers for solar-panel manufacturing, and China is considering limits on exports of advanced technologies to the United States. The space for simple pragmatism is narrowing.

The main threat to Musk’s prestige in China may now come not from regulators, but from China’s own industry. If local companies catch up with or surpass Tesla in batteries, software, autonomous driving and cost, his image as a technological prophet will gradually lose its uniqueness.

Yet that image is unlikely to disappear entirely. Musk has shaped too deeply the way China imagines the modern electric vehicle, the factory of the future and the speed of technological ambition. Even his competitors acknowledge that Tesla became a school for them, and its founder a standard against which they measured themselves.

The paradox of Musk in China is that Beijing needs him almost as much as it fears him. He brings innovation, capital, manufacturing discipline and global attention. But he also brings dependency, data, satellite power and political unpredictability.

That is why his Chinese status can no longer be described in a single word. He is not only a visionary and not only a problem. He is a mirror of an era in which technology business has become part of great-power politics. China can admire Musk, copy him, restrain him. But it can no longer ignore him.

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