Yeah he probably has some sort of friend who knows how to make a sufficient innovation, and he'll just give it to him. Its a pretty vague offer, don't you agree? 300 million, to "whomever can develop an automobile battery......"
Possible that its just a shitty written article, not specific in detail...or, its just some crazy thing he said.
If I were John McCain and I saw myself losing by 15 points the other day i'd say something desperate for headlines too. Quick 50 trillion to "whoever" can build me a robot dinosaur car that can fly.