Slashdot Mirror
Elon Musk Addresses New Jersey's Tesla Store Ban
An anonymous reader writes "On Tuesday, we discussed news that New Jersey is trying to ban Tesla stores, which would force the company to sell through car dealerships instead. Now, Elon Musk has prepared a response: 'The reason that we did not choose to do this is that the auto dealers have a fundamental conflict of interest between promoting gasoline cars, which constitute virtually all of their revenue, and electric cars, which constitute virtually none. Moreover, it is much harder to sell a new technology car from a new company when people are so used to the old. Inevitably, they revert to selling what's easy and it is game over for the new company. The evidence is clear: when has an American startup auto company ever succeeded by selling through auto dealers? The last successful American car company was Chrysler, which was founded almost a century ago, and even they went bankrupt a few years ago, along with General Motors. Since the founding of Chrysler, there have been dozens of failures, Tucker and DeLorean being simply the most well-known. In recent years, electric car startups, such as Fisker, Coda, and many others, attempted to use auto dealers and all failed.'"
They'll make you an offer you can't refuse.
Chris Christy isn't the only one with machinations.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
when will we learn?
Car dealerships are an anachronism. They offer no real added value. If it weren't for state laws protecting them, they would have been gone years ago - especially with the creation of the Internet.
The sales people are a nuisance, the parts section is to be avoided at all cost - and it really pisses me off when there are parts that are dealer only on rare occasions.
Warranty work? That could be streamlined too by having a tech of your choice do it.
I was hoping the Elon would take his billions and his cult of personality and crush the industry, but I guess that was a dream. I have the same dream for the elimination of Real Estate agents- another pointless middleman that just adds unnecessary costs to the consumer.
New Jersey isn't very large, and nobody is forcing Tesla to sell there. I'm sure a neighboring state would love to allow a showroom near it's border to collect all that tax revenue that NJ clearly has enough of, right?
No one's selling a car here.
Mostly random stuff.
I used to feel the same way about opticians, then I found http://zennioptical.com . I was able to get a pair or progressive glasses for less than the optician wanted to drill holes in their lens to use my frame.
"when has an American startup auto company ever succeeded by selling through auto dealers?" I thought Saturn was doing okay for a while, but looking briefly at wikipedia, I guess as GM took more control, it was doomed.
Are you saying that Chris Christy is machinima? Move over Max Headroom, that's really good shit! Where's the Kickstarter for their next digital marionette?
That's a bit of a double-edged comment, though, considering the subsidies Tesla has taken in the form of loans. When you encourage government to pick winners and losers, you can't be too surprised when they insist on doing both.
That said, good on Elon Musk for calling bullshit on this particular issue.
Imagine if you wanted an Apple computer you had to buy it through Best Buy or Radio Shack, and dealing with their personnel. The companies that do business this way are maddening. Elsewhere, companies like Cisco choose not to sell directly to buyers, making them go through a partner or reseller. This may have been an acceptable model years ago, but these days it's tedious and I think people expect more; they don't want to deal with a third party whose interests are not wholly aligned with their own. At least when you're talking about tech vendors, you can opt to deal with someone else who does business differently. Government enforcement of a given model is quite wrong-headed and needs to be stopped. It smacks of protectionism to me.
The rationale given for the regulation change that requires auto companies to sell through dealers is that it ensures “consumer protection”. If you believe this, Gov. Christie has a bridge closure he wants to sell you! Unless they are referring to the mafia version of “protection”, this is obviously untrue. As anyone who has been through the conventional auto dealer purchase process knows, consumer protection is pretty much the furthest thing from the typical car dealer’s mind.
Ow, that's gotta hurt!
[John]
Shit better not happen!
These loans that they have paid back early? Do you not consider bailing out the Big 3 to be a form of subsidy?
There's already a White House Petition for this. If this reaches it's target this will be the second time a pro Tesla petition has reached 100k plus signatures - https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/inform-new-jersey-markets-should-be-free-tesla-motors-and-everyone/ptHTHYMP
Not just loans - every Tesla car is "subsidized" by thousands of dollars via a tax write-off for the buyer.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
[rant]
I want to click a button and get a new car delivered to my location of choice, with the ability to shop around for the best price and with fair single-state taxation (at most). Car showrooms can be for viewing and test-driving. You could even charge a membership fee to be able to go look at physical products at a place that ISN'T actively trying to rip you off buy selling them to you at the highest price they can trick you into paying.
I want to be able to refinance my mortgage without spending umpteen hours shuffling paperwork (often FAXes for craying out loud), sitting down at a notary, again at a title insurance company, pay hundreds for yet another useless "appraisal" where they usually don't even look at the actual house, signing 900 papers, and paying thousands for the privilege while every single person or group involved takes their own cut (even if they try to lie about how it's "free" because all the excessive fees are used to increase the balance of the loan). The worst part is, this applies even if I try to re-fi with the bank I already have the loan at. If I can log in to my bank and pay my mortgage and manage my account, I should be able to click through a few online forms and voila, I've got a new loan term with a lower interest rate. It's not really much (if any) additional risk to them; I already owe them the money and I'm the same person I was when the loan was originated...
[/rant]
There's a BBC doc somewhere about the factories in China that make the "real" branded sunglasses. It's a bunch of Chinese workers in a nondescript white room operating injection molding machines. Some guy calls out "Switch!" in Cantonese, the workers swap out the dies, and it's Guccis for the next two hours.
Mostly random stuff.
Forgive me if this is answered somewhere else, but why can't Tesla open their own Tesla dealerships? Have the incumbents rigged that too?
None of them can see the clouds; The polished wings don't care.
It's not "every Tesla", it's "every EV". The feds are not picking a company here. They are kick-starting a new technology, regardless who makes it.
The traditional car companies get exactly the same subsidy.
http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg...
The first US cars were electric ones, actually.
Later they used steam.
Gasoline came third.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
According to the New Jersey MVC (PDF), if you purchased a vehicle in another state and paid sales tax on the vehicle, you provide MVC with the receipt. If you paid 7% or more sales tax in the other state, you pay no sales tax to New Jersey. If you paid less than 7%, you pay the difference to New Jersey. In practical terms, if the purchaser buys in the states neighboring New Jersey, there is no additional cost — New York State sales tax is 4%, Pennsylvania sales tax is 6%.
For example: Alice, who lives in Atlantic City, buys a Tesla in middle-of-nowhere Pennsylvania (6% rate) for $60,000. Alice pays Pennsylvania sales tax on that vehicle in the amount of $3600. If she had purchased the vehicle in New Jersey, she would have to pay $4200 in sales tax. So when registers her vehicle with the MVC, she'll owe the difference ($600), plus title fee ($60) and registration fee ($59 assuming it weighs under 3,500 pounds, see here), and possibly, if Christie is really an a-hole, a 0.4% Luxury Surcharge ($240). Keep in mind, if she purchased the vehicle in New Jersey, she'd pay the same sales tax, but all of it would go to New Jersey. If she purchased the vehicle in New York (4% sales tax), she would pay $2400 in tax to New York and $1800 in tax to New Jersey.
But, I could be missing something. If so, please let me know.
Finding God in a Dog
You can't be serious, making an insinuation like that on a good man.
Governor Christie is just concerned about the changes in traffic patterns that would be triggered by allowing electric cars to enter the state's vehicle markets unimpeded. Christie has a vision for the future of New Jersey and it is deeply important to him that municipal leaders across the state share his enthusiasm and goals. Enforcement along these lines would be impeded. Specifically, if the governor were to block off lanes to a bridge within a mayor's district, and everyone was driving electric cars, the smog wouldn't be as good for intimidating or disciplining the mayor. Clearly the traffic issues need more study.
Fun fact, Ford initially intended the model T to run on readily available alcohol. It could also run on kerosene apparently.
Is anyone actually dumb enough to believe that car dealerships would band together to protect the public from a new brand? Just what status do car dealerships have to complain about sales by another organisation? And why are our laws so useless that Tesla can not sue these dealers into the dark ages along with the state of New Jersey for using such tactics to try to sabotage a new company?
They are making a 3-wheeled car, which doesn't make it a car anymore, but a Motorcycle or "autocycle" -- which will exempt it from a lot of the legal wrangling that forces most car makers to give up trying to sell in the American Market.
Elio Motors. Google 'em.
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
Since Tesla only sells EVs, it is correct to say "every Tesla". I understand that the government is not picking a company, but it doesn't make Tesla any less dependent on federal aid.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Kerosene - we used to use that a lot when I was a kid. Part of the distillation tower column.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
This is an issue of allowing car companies to sell their own cars, I don't see how it matters whether or not those cars are gas, electric or nuclear powered.
There is an established (quite possibly corrupt) system, and Tesla is trying (possibly reasonably) to break it. I'm sure the dealers are happy to sell whatever makes them a profit, and of course resist any rules changes that will reduce that profit.
Anyone know the motivation behind the original law? Presumably GM would also like to be allowed to sell its own cars.
Since Tesla only sells EVs, it is correct to say "every Tesla".
It's pedantically correct, but disingenuous. The honest thing to say is "every EV".
Tesla any less dependent on federal aid.
And there you go beyond what you can prove. At the price Teslas are selling, an extra $7.5K would be very unlikely kill their market.
And if you didn't mean that, but simply that they receive federal aid, again ALL car companies that sell EVs do.
... maybe he should have called his company "Edison" ... maybe that way, he'd be facing less problems ... ... Edison was in part responsible for Tesla's failure in the end, even though Tesla had far more impressive inventions ... though many falsely aren't attributed to him ...)
(check out the history of Edison and Tesla
How quaint.
Funny thing is, it actually IS a conspiracy, factually and demonstrably so. They publicly claim to "protect" consumers while acting in ways that are unequivocally harmful to consumers.
conspiracy noun \kn-spir--s\
: a secret plan made by two or more people to do something that is harmful or illegal
If you approach a gas station in New Jersey and the guy standing next to the pump is 300 lbs overweight, be careful- it could be an ex-governor. Make sure to pull in slowly, give him some clearance, and fill up with 93. He may give you a strange piece of metal as a "gift". If it doesn't enter your skull at high velocity, take it (WTC steel, baby!). Then hand him a nice tip. Otherwise you might have to put the gas cap back on yourself a few blocks up the road- i.e. "self-service".
Hummer (GM) : Renco Group : LTV Aerospace : AM General ( American Motors) : Kaiser : Willys-Overland : Overland Automotive : Standard Wheel Company
In other words, Hummer's roots go back further than many modern auto companies.
"To those who are overly cautious, everything is impossible. "
MOST laws affecting commerce exist for ONE reason only: to protect big businesses that contribute money to the politicians who write the laws.
Think about it. How many laws that regulate commerce actually leave you, the citizen, better-off than you'd be without those laws? Have you ever noticed that nearly every set of regulations imposed on any sector of business serve to supress any new upstart businesses, while having not existed to hamper the rise of the current giants of the industry? Ford and GM were able to start and grow without any of the regulations that now apply, but a new innovator like Musk must pay the price to comply with those regulations from day-1 ... before he can make money selling his first car. This protects the big corrupt car companies from having to truly innovate and compete. Boeing was able to start building airplanes with NO regulations on its activities, but any new upstart wanting to make an airliner would have to spend decades and BILLIONS of dollars to clear the hurdles before being allowed to sell a first plane; this prevents them from having to truly innovate and compete. Apple was able to start selling home computers with essentially no regulation at all, but any new computer company must pass things like FCC emissions tests, deal with RoHS regulations and restrictions, a tidal wave of new labor laws and taxes that did not exist in 1975, etc while worrying about thousands of patents (particularly software patents - which did not exist when Apple and Microsoft were starting-up). Even with things geeks rarely think of, like railroads, this trend exists: When the railroads started, any group of investors could start a railroad by buying/building trains and rails and securing the required "right-of-way" for their rails... NOW, however, all railroads face a mountain of laws, including the legal problem of being under the regulatory thumb of Amtrak (the government's incompetent passenger rail service which gets to approve and regulate any potential competitor)
The voters are continually tempted by government promising to "protect them" with all manner of lobbyist-written and bribed-politician-sponsored laws and regulations - but the truth is that most of this junk is to help big business, big labor, and big government "scratch each-others' backs"... and "We the People" need to learn to see-through the propaganda and oppose all of it. Each of us needs to resists the urge to support the new garbage we think we might like or that we think might hurt people we don't like, and realize that WE are the ultimate targets of ALL of it.
Give me a break, Coda would have failed under any circumstances.
Musk, if you want to keep credibility, don't say incredible things.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
California and New York have lost probably near 1.5 million people over the last 15 years.
Uh, no. California's population has grown at a fairly steady rate for the past 100+ years. 1.5 million may have moved out of state, but far more have moved in to replace them.
There's a BBC doc somewhere about the factories in China that make the "real" branded sunglasses. It's a bunch of Chinese workers in a nondescript white room operating injection molding machines. Some guy calls out "Switch!" in Cantonese, the workers swap out the dies, and it's Guccis for the next two hours.
It's actually not hard to see why this is the case. What you see as many retail brands is really just a few companies...
Luxottica (which also owns Lens Crafters), Marchon (owned by VSP), and Safilo, plus a few smaller companies...
I think together the top three make up over 70% of the market.
...having multiple family members across multiple generations work for Chrysler in its various incarnations, I thought they should have folded. They were the weakest of "The Big Three", and the one with the least-relevant product line. I saw the dealership my grandfather was head mechanic at close, I saw all of the truly great products get morphed into "nostalgia-mobiles" for the mullet crowd.
The existing car market is a convoluted mess - the more agile imports have forced the industry to shift. Even the major players have 'fooled around' with bypassing the dealer system, ironically usually with alternative-energy vehicles (EV-1, Prius Gen 2's original launch, Leaf's original launch, etc.) That system worked well.
And nothing even says that Tesla will stay direct-only! If they expand to true "big player" status, they will probably be compelled to adopt a dealer strategy at least in part, to help their expansion!
LOL!
Let's see... Well, the obvious counterpoint to your argument is that PayPal *did* succeed. I happen to hate what it's become (all the abuses of banks, plus a few others, but even less regulation), but back when Musk was starting it up the idea was pretty revolutionary. Even further back, though, there's his startup Zip2, which was sold for over $340 million back in 99.
Since then, his *three* companies (people always forget SolarCity...) all seem to be doing fine. SpaceX has huge contracts, Tesla can't manufacture fast enough to keep up with demand, and SolarCity is one of the top installers of photovoltaic panels in the USA. Sure, they *could* fail, but so could IBM or Google or Coca-Cola. None of them are *likely* to, though. In fact, in the last decade Tesla is just about the only US-based car company that hasn't gone bankrupt...
As for whether the NJ law is aimed at Tesla, you'd have to be a worse nutjob than you claim Musk is to not see it. Let's see, a proposed bill that prohibits a car sales model which happens to be used by exactly one company in the world, right as that company is getting hugely successful? Yeah, there's no evidence at all that this is aimed squarely at Tesla... </SARCASM>
There's no place I could be, since I've found Serenity...
I don't see why a dealership would rather sell a gasoline car rather than an electric car. They are not a gas station and Tesla is rather expensive, presumably resulting in a larger sales commission. On the other hand, buyers would benefit from having multiple options for returns, resale, repairs and bargin shopping for older models. Also, if Tesla goes belly up, there is still hope of multi-brand dealerships offering at least some continued services.
Find the state with the least taxes. Sell each car bound for NJ to a buyer there. Let them sell it in the mall in NJ as a used car.
The evidence is clear: when has an American startup auto company ever succeeded by selling through auto dealers? The last successful American car company was Chrysler, which was founded almost a century ago, and even they went bankrupt a few years ago, along with General Motors. Since the founding of Chrysler, there have been dozens of failures, Tucker and DeLorean being simply the most well-known. In recent years, electric car startups, such as Fisker, Coda, and many others, attempted to use auto dealers and all failed.
Tucker's failure had to do with problems with the SEC and his own board of directors. Not because of anything having to do with dealerships but initially about selling accessories for cars he never produced. He had sold over 2000 dealerships at up to $30,000 a pop and it generated revenue, net inflow but because of these other problems he could never deliver the cars. The Dealerships weren't even a factor.
The DeLorean failed because of questions about the financial stability of DMC again by the SEC and selling a piece of crap that had reliability, quality and pricing problems. The DMC 12 had an MSRP of $25,000 which was pricey territory considering you could buy a full on European sports car for about $5,000 more that didn't have all of the problems the DMC 12 had. That and the fact that John DeLorean was caught up in in a drug scandal in 1982 didn't help the cause either. Ultimately DeLorean Motor Corp failed because nobody would invest in them because of these problems. The dealerships were actually on the side of consumers because they got tired of fixing problems that left the factory, so again, dealerships contributed to DeLorean's failure? No.
Fisker is recent history and it wasn't the failure of having dealerships. It was again, a $100,000 pile of crap that broke down and that coupled with the Obama Administration pushing green solutions (remember Solyndra?) agreed to loan money to Fisker so they kept expanding. When Solyndra blew up on the administration they stopped pumping money into Fisker citing delays. Fisker ran out of money because no more investment money was coming in and nobody was buying what they had because of the quality issues.
CODA failed because they built an ugly, overpriced vehicle that nobody wanted. Using an existing cheap Chinese car and making it electric while pricing it ridiculously high wasn't what the consumer wanted so it failed because of that. Were dealerships to blame for that strategy? No.
Given the author's dubious linkage to dealerships being a root cause of failure for these companies is disingenuous and it would seem more likely that:
1) Government Interference by Scrutiny/Questions about financial condition or impropriety and also including pushing your company to grow faster than you can.
- or -
2) Horrible/Overpriced Product with bad quality or lousy design that nobody wants to buy.
Are the more likely culprits here. We all agree Dealerships give people a licensed, well regulated licensed, way to print money by inflating costs to consumers. They don't really serve in the consumer's best interest and that's why all states have very strict laws governing how dealerships must operate and things like lemon laws should a vehicle become so deplorable that the consumer has a way out. In this day and age they are more outmoded considering other mechanisms for purchasing things that have evolved over the past 10 years however the guys who own dealerships have money and that money buys political influence. To a politician, a guy who gives you regular, large campaign contributions is somebody you'
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
That's not the point. The point is that the reason the loans were available to them at all was the government's decision to involve itself in the marketplace.
Online can be good like ZenniOptical, but if there's a problem, then it's shipping back and forth (at your own expense).
Since the base Zenni glasses are only around $6.95, it might not be worth shipping
California and New York have lost probably near 1.5 million people over the last 15 years.
Uh, no. California's population has grown at a fairly steady rate for the past 100+ years. 1.5 million may have moved out of state, but far more have moved in to replace them.
If that is true, why did California lose representation in Congress with the last decennial census?
Right, but Nissan could stop Leaf production tomorrow and be just fine. Not so with the Model S.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Right. Problem is that the people that moved out are those wealthy and/or smart enough to move out to avoid the high taxes. The people that move in tend to be those ignorant of the true cost of living (which means they will likely move out once they smarten up) or don't make enough income to pay much in taxes.
What is happening is that the people that know how to make money are leaving and the people that know how to leach off the state move in. If New York and California don't fix this then they will go bankrupt, if they haven't already.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
Keep in mind that the loans were available to any American automobile company. That at the time the legislation was written Tesla didn't even qualify for the loans should be even more kudos that Tesla was able to qualify themselves for the requirements to receive the loans. It was originally intended as a sort of bail-out to GM, and sort of fortunate that Tesla could submit a request for the same loan program. I have no idea why Fisker didn't qualify (or even if Fisker even tried), but that is a completely separate issue too. Also note that these loans had nothing at all to do with the Obama stimulus packages, something that it has been frequently been lumped into by clueless individuals since the announcement of the loans did take place about the same time other money was being doled out to a whole bunch of other companies under other programs.
I'll agree with you on principle here that the loans should never have been offered to anybody in the first place, but to single out Tesla in this case and claim that these loans are proof that the government is somehow favoring one company over another is simply false. It is a sort of favoring American companies over foreign counterparts, but that is international business negotiations where other countries do the same thing to companies based in their country.
I am not aware of the documentary indicated, but a quick search turned up this "60 minutes" video, also covering the subject: http://www.styleite.com/news/l...
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
And if Exxon stopped producing oil, they'd be fucked too.
But since they aren't going to do that in the foreseeable future, it's not an issue. For either company.
Besides, gasoline based cars have received huge subsidies. Think of the cost in money and lives of the wars fought to make sure their fuel keeps on being available at a low price. And the environmental costs.
Car dealers are not scum sucking bottom feeding hagfish. Neither are lawyers, banksters, coin dealers, or gun brokers. I have a philosophy, it's called BAD: If the person you are dealing with has Broker, Agent, or Dealer in their title, hang on tight to your wallet!!!! ;-D
Dear Microlimp: I give you 2 valid product keys for win7 and you reject both of them. Piss off you wankers!!!
Back in the 80s(? maybe?) Porsche tried to do the same thing. (Surveys frequently report that customers rate the dealer as the worst part of buying a car). The dealerships ganged up and stopped them them, too.
Hey, remember when Daewoo tried to get student sales reps to sell their cars on university campuses? That worked well...
Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
While I strongly feel that imported gasoline should be taxed to reflect its true cost, I have to disagree with you on your Exxon analogy. Oil would be profitable with or without government tax breaks. Only the "where" they choose to drill would change. Tesla is royally f'd if the feds discontinue the electric car tax credit, as it would completely destroy the already tortured calculus involved with total cost of ownership.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Outside of the US, many cars run on a wide range of fuels (diesel, ethanol, kerosene, etc.). It's really only in the US that everyone buys cars that refuse to run except on auto-grade gasoline. Works well for the oil companies, eh?
Enable 3D printed prosthetics!
I'm sure quite a few Indian and Chinese automakers would love to see the franchised dealer-only model go away.
Actually you may have hit on the real issue -- these dealership laws are really just old-fashioned protectionism in disguise.
Right. Oil would still be profitable. But so would Teslas. As I said, at the price point of the Model S, $7,500 isn't a deal breaker. They'd use a few sales for sure, but not the majority. They'd certainly not lose as many sales as Exxon would without subsidy.
Remember that at present Tesla is a niche car. 6,900 cars in a quarter. They are still serving the wealthy; they haven't got a product for the mass market yet.
Their next Model X is going for a lower priced market, but with features like falcon wing doors, it's obviously still not aimed at the mass market.
Presuming that price is set by the market, they would have to maintain prices, which means giving up $7500 per vehicle. Assuming that they keep the 7000 unit per quarter pace, that's a loss of $52 million vs last year.
Their other option is to hold the price steady and lose sales, which would also hurt revenue.
Tesla, in addition to being subsidized per-car directly also gets environmental credits from the government which they can then resell to other automakers. This is another subsidy. As you say, the subsidies are there for a reason and the fact that Tesla can exist at all is proof that they are working on some level. I'm not really casting any judgement on the wisdom of these subsidies... I'm suspicious of them but time will tell. But the fact is that Tesla has no viable business model without government help. Even with government help, I'm a bit pessimistic about their future. The instant battery technology can make these things viable to the mass market, they will have very strong competition. Even today, where almost no one can justify an electric car economically, they have competition at the lower end from several other traditional car makers.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Presuming that price is set by the market, they would have to maintain prices, which means giving up $7500 per vehicle.
Only if you define the market as "all cars". But it's not. People don't compare all cars and then just happen to end up with an EV. Not yet. People in the market for an EV are specifically looking for an EV. And any loss of subsidy would affect all EVs not just Tesla.
I've already accepted that losing the subsidy would lose some sales, as for a few people would pay $70,000 but not $77,500. But that window is not going to catch a huge proportion of their sales.
And I can demonstrate that. Tesla sells two models: The base Model S starts at US$69,900 with a 60 kWÂh battery pack up to US$79,900. Yet the $10,000 more expensive model is the more popular one.
But the fact is that Tesla has no viable business model without government help.
That's not a fact, that's your assumption, and it's a faulty one.
The instant battery technology can make these things viable to the mass market, they will have very strong competition.
Hopefully so. But so far Tesla have proved themselves to be the top EV company. It's hard to see that completely overturned to the point of bankruptcy by the dinosaurs running the traditional car companies.
It's hard to see that completely overturned to the point of bankruptcy by the dinosaurs running the traditional car companies.
Here we are into pure speculation... but if you'll indulge me... it's true that Tesla has executed very well, but the fact is that they only produce two models, and the most popular model only sells 7000 units per quarter. Scaling up to the size of even a niche player like BMW means ramping up production about 70x. My analysis could be flawed or naive, but it seems to me that a company like BMW should find it much simpler to squish an electric motor into their product while retaining quality than Tesla will find it to ramp production by such an amount while retaining quality. I wish them luck, because frankly I like Tesla - but I don't think they will be successful in the long term. Lexus (Toyota!), BMW, and Mercedes will eat their lunch when electric demand improves.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Scaling up to the size of even a niche player like BMW means ramping up production about 70x.
And Tesla is well placed for this. Their current factory is several times the area they are currently using. And their production line is mostly made from identical robots. So scaling production is mostly just a case of buying more robots. It looks more scalable to me than the traditional production lines, that whilst heavily mechanised, also use a lot more human workers.
I've seen videos of both the Tesla and Nissan Leaf production lines. There are quite a lot of such videos so I can't necessarily point you to the ones that I saw. But here's a shortish one from Wired that will give you the idea.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Then of course you'll have heard that they are in the process of creating the so called "gigafactory" for batteries, that will be bigger than all the worlds current capacity added together.
Tesla is not playing. They are perfectly executing a growth plan that's going to take them into the big league.
Scaling up to the size of even a niche player like BMW means ramping up production about 70x.
I certainly wouldn't call BMW niche. I've I stand by the side of the road I'll see them passing all the time. But then I live in the UK so that may be different from where you are.
My analysis could be flawed or naive, but it seems to me that a company like BMW should find it much simpler to squish an electric motor into their product while retaining quality than Tesla will find it to ramp production by such an amount while retaining quality.
Hell, BMW are making some nice dedicated EVs. They have a lower priced i3 that came out in Europe recently, and the i8 coming soon that's more in the Tesla Model S class.
I wasn't including BMW when I mentioned dinosaurs! I expect them to also be very successful with EVs. My thoughts were more with the car companies that do what you suggest - adapt existing ICE cars to have EV variants. Those will never be as good as purpose designed EVs.
If that is true, why did California lose representation in Congress with the last decennial census?
http://www.nytimes.com/interac... California's population up 10%, no seats gained or lost.