Google came close to buying car business Tesla

Google, which runs the world’s most popular search engine and email service, is also in the car business.

The online giant has been developing a self-driving car and in 2013, Google attempted to purchase the luxury electric car company Tesla.

“The deal went past handshake territory and both company’s lawyers drafted up negotiations, but somewhere along the way, the deal fell through,” reported Fast Company. “By May 2013, Tesla had turned everything around and posted its first quarterly profit.”

The deal would have turned Elon Musk, founder of Tesla, into a Google employee among other things.

“He proposed that Google buy Tesla outright — with a healthy premium, the company would have cost about $6 billion at the time — and pony up another $5 billion in capital for factory expansions,” reported Bloomberg News. “He also wanted guarantees that Google wouldn’t break up or shut down his company before it produced a third-generation electric car aimed at the mainstream auto market.”

Due to some frenzied car sales and Musk putting his own money into the company to buy nonfunctioning cars back from customers, Tesla was able to turn a profit and pay off the debts that it originally incurred.

“Within two weeks of that announcement, the company’s shares had doubled, and Tesla had repaid its $465 million loan from the U.S. Department of Energy early, with interest,” reported Bloomberg News, “Musk broke off his negotiations with Google. He no longer needed a savior.”

If Google finally creates a road-worthy self-driving car, it won’t bear the Tesla logo for now.

In a separate piece, Bloomberg News interviewed Ashlee Vance, who recently wrote a book titled “Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future,” who said that rumors are going around that Musk is in talks with Apple regarding the sale of Tesla, but he puts almost no stock in those rumors.

“All the rumors today have been around Apple buying Tesla, and as far as I know those discussions really haven’t come close to this sort of thing and everyone has kind of missed on the Google part,” said Vance. “Tesla doesn’t really need to sell as much anymore. I mean, they’re able to raise capital for all of these ambitious things they’re doing with the battery factory, their stock prices are still high enough they look healthy, and Elon has enough money on his own.”