San Francisco, Mar 24 (IANS): Tesla CEO Elon Musk has made a new comment about the Tesla Cybertruck, which recently took a backseat, and said that the automaker aims to complete Cybertruck development this year for production in 2023.

During an event for the start of Model Y deliveries at Gigafactory Berlin, Musk was asked by an employee about Tesla's short-term goals, reports the auto-tech website Electrek.

Musk reiterated that Tesla's focus this year is to ramp up production of current vehicle programmes, especially Model Y and Model 3, but he also offered a rare comment on Cybertruck. He said that Tesla aims to complete the development of the Cybertruck this year for production in 2023.

"We want to complete the development of Cybertruck this year and be ready for production next year," Musk was quoted as saying.

When Tesla unveiled the Cybertruck back in 2019, Tesla said that the electric pickup truck would make it to market by the end of 2021. As the deadline was approaching, the automaker confirmed that production slipped to 2022.

Musk later said that Tesla was targeting a start of production for the electric pickup truck in "late 2022" at Gigafactory Texas.

With the focus clearly on bringing the Model Y to production at the factory, and that being delayed as well, it appeared likely that the Cybertruck production timeline could also slip, the report said.

During Tesla's last earnings report in January, Musk gave an update confirming that Tesla wouldn't launch the Cybertruck or any new vehicle in 2022.

The CEO remained vague when it comes to the electric pickup truck and only said that it would "hopefully come next year" - meaning in 2023.

Since then, there have been rumours that Tesla is planning to start production of the Cybertruck in early 2023.