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Tesla to raise $1B

ir.tesla.com

81–90 of 334 posts

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is because Yahoo got overtaken by Google's superior ad platform and search. Tesla has no obvious viable competitors. It is a premium product that caters to a specific demographic, much like the iPhone in 2007.

Have you heard about this car company called Chevrolet ? They have this car called the Bolt. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevrolet_Bolt

What vehicle that Tesla produces is most similar to the bolt? Tesla produces high end luxury cars. The Chevrolet bolt is not that.

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Although I applaud your skepticism, I think it's misplaced. My first job out of University was working for Daimler-Benz when they owned Chrysler. I was a front line eng supervisor at the plant level focusing on In System Damage, Federal Torque and a host of other quality issues that were plaguing the company at the time. I dealt directly with it so I can tell you, Supply Chain is not that big a deal to fix. They will…

I'm very curious how you were able to save the company millions of dollars.

It was an exercise in creative problem solving. I'd query the data to find out where on the line the most (costly x incidence) problems were occurring and then devise a solution. If a worker was scratching the paint every time he put his tool down the secure a fastener, we'd get a heavy rubber guard fabricated, change his man assignment and have him put down the guard before he did his little peice, or even better change the tool if that was possible. If you are curious, yes there were workers who would damage the vehicle every time and let it go to rework. Don't even get me started on labor. :)

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#83

As an investor of Tesla who bought into Elon's vision I've been getting more and more nervous about how the company is actually run at this point. A modern car company is as much of a production and supply chain company as it's a product and tech company. I get the feeling that due to Tesla being cutting edge in the tech department it led to all the supply chain/production problems being treated as if they are speed…

I absolutely love Musk and the idea of Telsa. Hell, I would love to get me a Model S, if I could.

But I completely agree with you. I think the Model 3 will end up costing way more that $35k, to turn a profit. The timeline will slip and it won't come out until 2018. The whole solar city deal was premature.

I think Musk knows this isn't going to work, at least for a while. I think he knows Telsa is going to have a more expensive Model 3 and they're going to bleed cash. Telsa will lose money on every sale of the Model 3. I bet money, he plans to ride the stock for the next 5 years until they can get things turned around.

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#84

Tesla is basically taking on a loan in form of a convertible notes. probably much smarter to distribute their lender among multiple entities than one giant bank that would have leverage on them. Also, it looks like Tesla would use a portion of the money to inflate their share prices via a small buyback. The after market trading so far make this strategy look successful. So at the end of a day: Tesla is raising capita…

> probably much smarter to distribute their lender among multiple entities than one giant bank that would have leverage on them. A less charitable reading is that no single lender wanted to write the debt. A billion isn't substantial...

Exactly!

If you owe a bank $10MM and you default on the loan, you have a problem.

If you owe a bank $10BB and you default on the loan, the bank has a problem.

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#85
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is because Yahoo got overtaken by Google's superior ad platform and search. Tesla has no obvious viable competitors. It is a premium product that caters to a specific demographic, much like the iPhone in 2007.

What about all the other manufacturers focusing on electric-only vehicles?

Tesla caters to specific high-end market, which it dominates by far. Many also tried to copy the iphone and ipod but also failed

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#86
post #64

As an investor of Tesla who bought into Elon's vision I've been getting more and more nervous about how the company is actually run at this point. A modern car company is as much of a production and supply chain company as it's a product and tech company. I get the feeling that due to Tesla being cutting edge in the tech department it led to all the supply chain/production problems being treated as if they are speed…

The upcoming Model 3 will be the acid test for Tesla. It will no doubt be a good car, but at this point people should focus less on what the car can do and on how the car will be rolled out, sold and supported afterwards. A wealthy Model S customer may be ok with having the car in the shop after a minor accident for 5 months due to lack of replacement parts, but for an average Joe paying $500/month leasing a Model 3…

I'm really not sure, and I have to admit that the reason I'm concerned for my investment is that part of me don't think they can.

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#87

As an investor of Tesla who bought into Elon's vision I've been getting more and more nervous about how the company is actually run at this point. A modern car company is as much of a production and supply chain company as it's a product and tech company. I get the feeling that due to Tesla being cutting edge in the tech department it led to all the supply chain/production problems being treated as if they are speed…

AP2 is truly dangerous. It's incomprehensible they would release something like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZ1XLqc5IUg I guess it's a good reality check for autonomous cars when you take away the LIDAR toys. One rather important point is that the car often doesn't realize it is screwing up, because quelle surprise, realizing you don't have a correctly detected lane can be just as difficult as detecting one…

Before Tesla Legal bared their teeth George Hotz was going to buy a Tesla, hack it and run his own proprietary software on AP2's hardware. It would've been hilarious because Comma.ai is a tiny little fly by night operation outperforming AP2 using cheap, over the counter hardware.

That local roads update was an embarrassment, what was Tesla thinking? I mean, they're talking L5 by the end of the year, and this is what their autopilot division has to show for themselves.

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#88
post #33
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curious: What do you think is Tesla/Musk's "end game vision"?

To make humanity an interplanetary species. http://www.theverge.com/2016/9/27/13079472/elon-musk-mars-sp...

I'm really hoping that when Tesla implodes it has no effect on SpaceX.

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Elon said in a recent earnings call that, while they would probably be fine without a raise, they expected it would make investors more comfortable if they did a raise and thus might do one.

"Elon said..." has started enough apologies for Tesla's poor judgement that I've become numb to it. They're all of the form "while it may look like we're weak, actually ...(poorly reasoned explanation for the weakness)", and it has been going on for years. I hope they figure out car production by 2019.

I am refuting the suggestion that Tesla wasn't planning a raise. Elon told investors in an investor call that they would likely do a raise.

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#90

If I were to make a computer analogy, I would probably say that Tesla in having to deliver the Model 3, is right at the point IBM was when they were finishing up the IBM 360 series: it will be a make or break product release for them. http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/ibm100/us/en/icons/system3... quote from Thomas J Watson Jr.: “The expense of the project was indeed staggering. We spent three quarters of a billion d…

Reading about the S/360 is insane...no one makes investments like that anymore. This would be the equivalent of Intel or someone spending $40 billion dollars on engineering the and the infrastructure needed to build a quantum computer today. (What's interesting is that they would survive even if the expense didn't pan out, but no large successful company would ever do this today.)
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