Electric-car company Tesla Motors has filed notice it intends to go to court to appeal New Jersey's ruling that would stop it from selling its vehicles in the state within two weeks.
The notice seeks to overturn regulations imposed by the state Motor Vehicle Commission that require new-car dealers to have franchise agreements before they can be licensed.
Those regulations effectively will prohibit Tesla from using its direct-sales model.
The company, based in Palo Alto, California, has been selling cars at two locations in New Jersey for about two years. Its electric cars retail for about $60,000 before incentives.
Tesla contends that forcing it to operate under a franchise agreement would be self-defeating.
"Franchise dealers have an inherent conflict of interest in selling electric vehicles," the filing says.
"In order to do so effectively, they would need to enthusiastically tout the reasons why electric vehicles are superior to gasoline vehicles. This is not something that they are going to do since gasoline vehicles represent virtually all of their revenue."
