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Tesla plans China factory that can make 500,000 vehicles a year

latimes.com

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Re: Tesla plans China factory that can make 500,000 vehicles a year

#61

Post by jdblair »

hrktb wrote: post #43
mkhalil wrote: post #18

Tesla should be very wary of the very real threat from corporate espionage in China. Brining a factory to China would allow a bad actor to really get into enterprise and create even better clones. Tesla wouldn't be able to keep up financially if Chinese manufactures built cars using Tesla research resources. side thought: Maybe TESLA turns into a research company that sells its IP to manufactures instead of actually…

I’m not into cars, sorry if it’s a stupid question. Does Tesla have that much valuable research ? I thought their manufacturing process came from external actors with experience in “legacy” car makers. Same with their batteries technology, didn’t big players like Panasonic intervene to bring their experience ? Regarding AI or software they don’t seem to be ahead of the other players either. From a distance, Tesla loo…

Tesla invented battery management technology to scale up bundles of small lithiun ion cells. This requires significant engineering to get right: cells charge and discharge at different rates, heat must be managed and failed cells taken out of the stack. Nobody was doing this commercially when they built the first roadster. IIRC they shared this tech with Toyota pretty early on.

This is all basic electrical engineering, and now reproduced by other carmakers, but Tesla did it first.

For example, when I was at National Semiconductor working on Solar tech (2010ish), another team was building systems for lithium ion battery management for cars. They did this to sell the tech to car makers.

Re: Tesla plans China factory that can make 500,000 vehicles a year

#62

Post by nothrabannosir »

throwaway5752 wrote: post #23
nopinsight wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe the primary reasons are that China, together with Hong Kong, is already one of Tesla's largest markets and it has a great potential for growth as well.

At some point, you have to expect that single party control of a government that is hostile to clean tech and initiating a trade war with the worlds largest consumer market for the next 50 years is going to accelerate the exodus of brains and production from the US, too.

Is China hostile to clean tech? I thought they were one of the biggest driving forces behind clean energy out there.

They also pollute, a lot, because they produce a lot of energy full stop. Afaik they do everything and anything, right now.

Burning coal doesn’t make you anti clean energy , it just makes you a polluter. It’s a bit ironic , but then again: welcome to China :p

Re: Tesla plans China factory that can make 500,000 vehicles a year

#63

Post by leesec »

hrktb wrote: post #43
mkhalil wrote: post #18

Tesla should be very wary of the very real threat from corporate espionage in China. Brining a factory to China would allow a bad actor to really get into enterprise and create even better clones. Tesla wouldn't be able to keep up financially if Chinese manufactures built cars using Tesla research resources. side thought: Maybe TESLA turns into a research company that sells its IP to manufactures instead of actually…

I’m not into cars, sorry if it’s a stupid question. Does Tesla have that much valuable research ? I thought their manufacturing process came from external actors with experience in “legacy” car makers. Same with their batteries technology, didn’t big players like Panasonic intervene to bring their experience ? Regarding AI or software they don’t seem to be ahead of the other players either. From a distance, Tesla loo…

I think their advantage comes in the fact that their car IS a computer. They're the only OEM that can do meaningful OTA updates to the car. It is a massive advantage and none of the other manufacturers have close to the same infrastructure.

Re: Tesla plans China factory that can make 500,000 vehicles a year

#64

Post by taobility »

tachyonbeam wrote: post #42
ricw wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm doubtful this will happen, based on what we've seen in the car industry in the past. Foreign car companies have had to build cars via Chinese joint ventures for decades, and as yet, not a single Chinese car company has seen any large success outside of China.

AFAIK, Chinese people themselves tend to prefer foreign cars, see them as higher quality status symbols.

Difference classes have different preference. For normal families, they would prefer affordable domestic brands, and for higher classes, they would buy foreign brands, or fully imported cars. But most people would buy domestic ones which is easy to understand

Re: Tesla plans China factory that can make 500,000 vehicles a year

#65

Post by dmode »

mkhalil wrote: post #18

Tesla should be very wary of the very real threat from corporate espionage in China. Brining a factory to China would allow a bad actor to really get into enterprise and create even better clones. Tesla wouldn't be able to keep up financially if Chinese manufactures built cars using Tesla research resources. side thought: Maybe TESLA turns into a research company that sells its IP to manufactures instead of actually…

This doesn't really makes sense. Apple has been manufacturing there forever and in the process became the most valuable company in the world.

Re: Tesla plans China factory that can make 500,000 vehicles a year

#66

Post by Retric »

ryanmercer wrote: post #50

Hopefully for export, otherwise they'll unfortunately mostly be powered by coal :(

China uses more coal and produces more CO2 for electricity, but uses less total fossil fuels (60.6%) than the US (64.2%). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_China VS. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_of_the_Unit...

China has a significantly higher % of it's electricity generated from renewables than the USA and a much faster adoption curve. So, adding electric cars is still a very large net gain for the environment over IC cars.

Re: Tesla plans China factory that can make 500,000 vehicles a year

#68

Post by _rpd »

hrktb wrote: post #43
mkhalil wrote: post #18

Tesla should be very wary of the very real threat from corporate espionage in China. Brining a factory to China would allow a bad actor to really get into enterprise and create even better clones. Tesla wouldn't be able to keep up financially if Chinese manufactures built cars using Tesla research resources. side thought: Maybe TESLA turns into a research company that sells its IP to manufactures instead of actually…

I’m not into cars, sorry if it’s a stupid question. Does Tesla have that much valuable research ? I thought their manufacturing process came from external actors with experience in “legacy” car makers. Same with their batteries technology, didn’t big players like Panasonic intervene to bring their experience ? Regarding AI or software they don’t seem to be ahead of the other players either. From a distance, Tesla loo…

My understanding is that, like SpaceX, Tesla's goal is to build a large number of the required parts in house, enabling rapid design iteration. There is also a goal to automate a large proportion of the manufacturing process, although it has become clear that the limits of current technology are being tested here.

Re: Tesla plans China factory that can make 500,000 vehicles a year

#69

Post by drfuchs »

nothrabannosir wrote: post #62
throwaway5752 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At some point, you have to expect that single party control of a government that is hostile to clean tech and initiating a trade war with the worlds largest consumer market for the next 50 years is going to accelerate the exodus of brains and production from the US, too.

Is China hostile to clean tech? I thought they were one of the biggest driving forces behind clean energy out there. They also pollute, a lot, because they produce a lot of energy full stop. Afaik they do everything and anything, right now. Burning coal doesn’t make you anti clean energy , it just makes you a polluter. It’s a bit ironic , but then again: welcome to China :p

Throwaway5752 is referring not to China, but rather the USA, as having “single party control of a government that is hostile to clean tech and initiating a trade war with the worlds largest consumer market for the next 50 years“.

Re: Tesla plans China factory that can make 500,000 vehicles a year

#70

Post by jonknee »

adventured wrote: post #20
jonknee wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By issuing the debt and new shares that Elon swears he's not going to do.

You're misconstruing what Musk actually said. He said they're not going to need to issue / raise in 2018. They're not going to begin building a factory in China this year and won't need financing for it in the next five or six months. Edit: for the anti-Tesla downvoters - "CEO Elon Musk has said that Tesla wouldn't require new funding in 2018, in either equity or debt. On a call with investors, in response a question…

The year doesn't matter, I have full confidence he'll keep saying they don't need to raise money right up until the day they raise money.
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