111–120 of 395 posts
Felt the presentation ended half way. Wanted him to show the inside of the car and all the features. Caught the glimpse the new horizontal screen, but no details on that in the presentation or on the side.... Wonder if they are not ready with all those yet. Or maybe I am used to Apple keynotes
Pretty smart looking car. Doesn't ape the Model S' look too much, clearly looks a little more compact, and the roofline makes it look both roomy and a little space-agey. From the front it almost has a Porsche Panamera look going on... Nice looking car. I wish Tesla good luck, though I don't think they'll need it.
They announced during the livestream that they already have 115k preorders. Pretty crazy considering that they were all made site-unseen (I guess barring Tesla employees that placed their preorder and knew what the car looked like).
It's funny too, I never thought about the price point they're actually selling it for. I can afford one, and might just get one for my wife (my car is still new-ish, and efficient enough).
Tesla's current production rate is about 70,000 units a year. Yes, the NUMMI plant once produced 500K vehicles a year on that site, but that just means Tesla has lots of empty building shell into which they can expand.
The real problem is profitability. Bloomberg is skeptical.[1] Tesla isn't profitable, and they have a high price point now. Cutting the price means they have to produce at a far lower cost while expanding factory capacity. That will be very tough. Jason Wheeler, Tesla's CFO, is going to have to come up with some creative financial strategies. But with near-zero interest rates, and lots of pre-orders, they can probably borrow heavily for plant at very low cost.
[1] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2016-03-31/tesla-double...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
He announced 115,000 reservations before the stream began. That's $115m spent on a product no one had seen. Crazy.
The car looks comparable to a Honda CRZ or a Toyota Prius (or a Subaru BRZ). They should have gone with the small-sedan form factor, but I think they believe it will cannibalize Model S sales.
Since when is a car under 35K is considered luxury?
Yes the car is amazing in a ton of other ways, and yes the look will probably grow on me over time, but I don't want to "learn to love it". I want to innately find it beautiful at first glance. And my initial, instinctual reaction to the unveil was...a feeling of slight letdown.
For the price point, I would obviously still buy one... but the hatchback style is not as appealing for a mid level luxury car that may compete with a MB C-class or BMW 3-series.
They could have made it look like an Audi A4 sedan, with an available hatchback, but I think that would cannibalize Model S sales to some extent.
Tesla also announced they are going to increase Model S prices starting this month. This could be part of their strategy to increase Model S sales now, before they release revisions in the future.
What's also interesting is that Tesla cleared all CPO inventory at the beginning of the year. On their Pre-Owned site, they had used Model S going for less than 50k. They cleared it all out early in the year and now only offer recent models as inventory for lease/purchase.
Felt the presentation ended half way. Wanted him to show the inside of the car and all the features. Caught the glimpse the new horizontal screen, but no details on that in the presentation or on the side.... Wonder if they are not ready with all those yet. Or maybe I am used to Apple keynotes
Hopefully some vehicle reviewers will test drive it and we'll learn more going forward. Or when Tesla's site comes online.
Felt the presentation ended half way. Wanted him to show the inside of the car and all the features. Caught the glimpse the new horizontal screen, but no details on that in the presentation or on the side.... Wonder if they are not ready with all those yet. Or maybe I am used to Apple keynotes
I love Tesla the company and respect the hell out of Elon. But his presentation style is hard to watch - he is literally stammering through what feels like a dry script. I've never seen him live before is this par for the course or nerves? Edit - wow that is a better looking car than I expected. You can be as awkward serving as you like if that's the main course!
I rather like his presentation style. For some reason it strikes me as genuine, like he's someone I can relate with and look up to. He doesn't need to be a flashy salesman because his projects will sell themselves.