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Tesla Posts Big Quarterly Loss as Its Electric-Car Sales Lag

nytimes.com

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Re: Tesla Posts Big Quarterly Loss as Its Electric-Car Sales Lag

#581

Post by aaomidi »

sorenjan wrote: post #491
aaomidi wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These videos are getting old, boring, and annoying. Everyone who drives a tesla knows how their car behaves. I don't expect it to see that barrier when I'm driving my model 3. Listen - it's hard to imagine what it's actually like to drive a Tesla and learning what it can or can't do. Everyone driving a tesla right now knows that the autopilot is more like a rookie co-pilot that needs monitoring and checking all along…

So you missed the point about how it started behaving differently overnight after an update? Getting people used to one behavior and then changing it without their knowledge is fine in mobile apps, not so much when it's driving your car in traffic.

I didn't. I got this update too. It didn't start entirely behaving differently - it was handling the outside world a little differently and was fixed within a couple of days.

I'm not defending tesla here, I'm just saying this tech is still far better than the average driver paying barely any attention to the road.

Re: Tesla Posts Big Quarterly Loss as Its Electric-Car Sales Lag

#582

Post by sjwright »

mtgx wrote: post #550
hef19898 wrote: post #480

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It still comes down to a race between Tesla figuring out the complete automotive supply chain and competitors figuring out EVs. Tesla had, and I would assume still has, production hell. Now it's delivery hell. Both are solved, controlled and executed constantly by other car companies (VW has an exception with the new Golf 8 that proves the rule). The competition is still struggling to solve EVs, some like Jaguar and…

Tesla is wasting time, money and focus by investing too much in self-driving tech (they're even having their own chip division now! - is Tesla really in financial a position to compete with Intel/Nvidia now?). Not to mention they made all of their Model 3's thousands of dollars more expensive by including the "full self-driving hardware-that-wasn't" in every unit to the point where it didn't even make sense for Tesla…

I think you underestimate how many companies do chip design. That part of it is actually quite unremarkable.

And while that transitional Nvidia hardware obviously isn't ideal, it's still necessary to run Autopilot today. And it is what is allowing Tesla to gather mountains of real world training data for its machine learning algorithms.

I'm not confident Tesla will pull off their vision of a driverless taxi business, but if they do pull it off, the business fundamentals promise astronomical revenues. Nobody questions that Uber and Lyft are viable businesses. Tesla's plan is to be in their space but with cheaper fuel, cheaper labor and a greater revenue share.

Re: Tesla Posts Big Quarterly Loss as Its Electric-Car Sales Lag

#583

Post by mtw »

bravo22 wrote: post #580
mtw wrote: post #564

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Toyota and Tesla merging would be great. Toyota masters scaling and world-wide logistics but doesn't have EV technology. Their software is also very basic. Tesla doesn't control logistics but master EV and autopilot. Them merging is not impossible, Toyota once had a stake in Tesla.

Elon would be a roadblock to such a merge. Toyota won't be able to function with him in any managerial position. I doubt he'll accept anything less than full control. He won't be content as an "evangelist".

If his dream is really to have the world switch from ICE to EV cars, then he should consider this. That would be an engineering and laudable feat, and he would be in the annals of history. He can then focus on SpaceX and go to Mars. But if his dream is to become ultra-wealthy and be like Stark in Ironman, then I guess he can keep to himself Tesla.

Re: Tesla Posts Big Quarterly Loss as Its Electric-Car Sales Lag

#584

Post by tnolet »

mcv wrote: post #561
neuronic wrote: post #469

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As another German I can definitely tell you that no one here sees a Model 3 at anywhere near a BMW in production quality. If Tesla intends to market the Model 3 at the "BMW audience" - whatever differentiates them from, say, the "Audi audience" - they are horribly miscalculating at what German people expect from a car. It is not limited to EV range. Also, Volkswagen is ramping up production on their Modular Electric…

Maybe not the Model 3, but the model S has replaced a lot of the Mercedeses that used to dominate the taxi fleet in Amsterdam. It's entirely possible that Germany is more conservative than Amsterdam, though.

This was mostly due to a tax incentive if I remember correctly.

Re: Tesla Posts Big Quarterly Loss as Its Electric-Car Sales Lag

#585

Post by rcxdude »

imglorp wrote: post #522
hef19898 wrote: post #480

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It still comes down to a race between Tesla figuring out the complete automotive supply chain and competitors figuring out EVs. Tesla had, and I would assume still has, production hell. Now it's delivery hell. Both are solved, controlled and executed constantly by other car companies (VW has an exception with the new Golf 8 that proves the rule). The competition is still struggling to solve EVs, some like Jaguar and…

Tesla has one more advantage over all the fossils: they're all in. The old guys are still challenged on mission, twisted up and fighting internally, bringing out weak token products designed to not hurt their ICE lines.

From what I know of at least european car makers, they see the writing on the wall, especially with various governments making noises about banning petrol and diesel cars in the next decase or so, and they are heavily investing in the switch, even if it's not so obvious to consumers at the moment because the industry moves slowly.

Re: Tesla Posts Big Quarterly Loss as Its Electric-Car Sales Lag

#586

Post by fengb »

golfer wrote: post #168
sandworm101 wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A few more years of this amd they may be bought out by the likes of BMW. The tesla brand is worth something, even if on the hood of a german car.

Tesla has about $9B in debt. They are not an attractive takeover candidate. They've never turned an annual profit.

Much worse than that: their (pre-market) valuation is 44B and takeovers require shareholder agreement, usually at least 20% premium to the market — I'd wager the ask price would be a lot more but let's be conservative... 53B buys you a 9B debt.

Re: Tesla Posts Big Quarterly Loss as Its Electric-Car Sales Lag

#587

Post by freddref »

mtw wrote: post #564
ProfessorLayton wrote: post #81

Tesla's 1.5B reduction of cash on hand was largely due to the 920M convertible bond payment — but that only happened because TSLA didn't perform to the level necessary for conversion (~$360 IIRC). I wonder what changes in terms this'll warrant for future capital raises. Then they mention that they missed a lot of revenue due to missing half their shipments overseas, and onto Q2 (But also expecting a loss in Q2). Sale…

Toyota and Tesla merging would be great. Toyota masters scaling and world-wide logistics but doesn't have EV technology. Their software is also very basic. Tesla doesn't control logistics but master EV and autopilot. Them merging is not impossible, Toyota once had a stake in Tesla.

Toyota has solved enough EV for practical requirements, in the form of hybrids. They've over a decade experience in deploying for practical purposes.

Toyota's "basic" software can be an advantage, it works. Autopilot is far from mastered, by anyone.

Re: Tesla Posts Big Quarterly Loss as Its Electric-Car Sales Lag

#588

Post by dforrestwilson »

mtw wrote: post #583
bravo22 wrote: post #580

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Elon would be a roadblock to such a merge. Toyota won't be able to function with him in any managerial position. I doubt he'll accept anything less than full control. He won't be content as an "evangelist".

If his dream is really to have the world switch from ICE to EV cars, then he should consider this. That would be an engineering and laudable feat, and he would be in the annals of history. He can then focus on SpaceX and go to Mars. But if his dream is to become ultra-wealthy and be like Stark in Ironman, then I guess he can keep to himself Tesla.

This is a guy with 5 Beverly Hills mansions and a private jet. All financed via his Tesla stock.

It seems as though any sacrifices related to "the mission" are expected to come from Tesla and SpaceX employees who have to suffer through periodic rounds of layoffs.

https://variety.com/gallery/elon-musk-buys-fifth-bel-air-hom...

https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-elon-musk-mortgages-m...

Re: Tesla Posts Big Quarterly Loss as Its Electric-Car Sales Lag

#589

Post by treis »

moduspol wrote: post #163
treis wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This is the point that so many people miss when arguing that an EV revolution is coming and others will catch Tesla. It's not that Tesla's lead is insurmountable; it's that Tesla's lead is growing, not shrinking, with each passing day. Eventually you reach a point where everything is good enough so being better isn't much of an advantage. Like if Tesla gives you 700 mi range but Audi does 500mi, does anyone really c…

> Like if Tesla gives you 700 mi range but Audi does 500mi, does anyone really care? In this case, yes, because current battery tech charges much faster from 0-80% of the battery, so a battery with more range than you'll use is still beneficial because it'll charge faster for the portion you do use. But I'm being snarky--that's not your point. Tesla's advantage is far more than just range. * The battery management sy…

I think you're wrong about Tesla having an advantage in the non-electric parts of the car. The legacy car makers are way way better at actually building cars at a profit. If a big touchscreen was a way to do that they have the chops to pull it off (or at least one of the suppliers does).

There is/was a race between Tesla getting good at traditional car manufacturing and the legacy car makers coming up with their own EVs. It appears that Tesla is going to lose that race. Or at least not win it by enough where they will end up as one of the bigger car companies.

Re: Tesla Posts Big Quarterly Loss as Its Electric-Car Sales Lag

#590

Post by danso »

tokyodude wrote: post #464
radium3d wrote: post #252

Seasonal 4th to 1st quarter may have been a loss but these numbers stand out to me as being a bit more important. Cars sold: Q1 2019: 63,000 Q1 2018: 29,980 Q1 2017: 25,000 Q1 2016: 14,820 Q1 2015: 10,045 Q1 2014: 6,457 Q1 2013: 4,900 Q1 2012: 0 Revenue Q1 2019: $4.5 billion Q1 2018: $3.4 billion Q1 2017: $2.7 billion Q1 2016: $1.6 billion Q1 2015: $1.1 billion Q1 2014: $713 million Q1 2013: $562 million Q1 2012: $30…

Sounds like what you're doing is proving the NYTimes is part of the fake news problem. I wonder given your data above if the NYTimes could be sued for liable for reporting something easily provably false.

The quarterly loss comes directly from Tesla’s own reporting. You don’t think loss is derived only from revenue, do you?
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