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Tesla Q1 2021 Results

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Re: Tesla Q1 2021 Results

#251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

like 90%+ of living beings on the planet use eyes to navigate. Seems to work for them. None use LIDAR or RADAR, only a few use SONAR.

By that reasoning, shouldn’t the fastest living beings move around on wheels instead of legs? Just because something works for evolution/nature, it doesn’t mean that there isn’t a simpler/better engineering alternative. We have spend hopelessly many years trying to build machines that walk — Now Boston Dynamics seem to be there. But it is really complicated compared to wheels, and their machines are not running at 2-…

Birds do exist and can reach speeds up to 200 mph (320 km/h).

Re: Tesla Q1 2021 Results

#252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s pretty flat compared to the share valuation.

This is peak HN, calling 30% annual growth on a $750 billion company flat

The $750 billion valuation (approaching the combined value of other car companies) is precisely why I said that it was flat compared to the valuation growth, the valuation has grown about 1300% in the last few years.

Also the vast majority of those profits are not car sales but regulatory credits and Bitcoin sales, they are barely in profit on selling cars, which makes the valuation even more absurdly optimistic. IMO Tesla will do well and get to perhaps 30% of the global car market and some of energy, but that still doesn’t justify their valuation today, let alone any future growth.

Re: Tesla Q1 2021 Results

#253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have two separate and (mostly) unrelated feelings. Musk has done something remarkable as you say. At the same time, the market cap is nuts and a portent of doom. Bigger than all car companies combined, by market cap? A market crash could take down Tesla and set back electric car adoption by 20 years.

A few years ago I'd agree it would be a major EV setback but there are so many other options now I don't think that's the case any longer. I'm very optimistic about Rivian. It's Tesla but without the ego thinking they are smarter than 50 years of manufacturing lessons.

I think that if Tesla were to go belly-up because of some sharemarket issue, that it'd be very easy for all the other manufacturers to back off their BEV plans. Not necessarily outright cancel them, but just not push for it and possibly let it fizzle somewhat. They'd have the excuse that "Well, Tesla failed, and they were more valuable than all of us combined at one point, so... we'll just be more cautious"

One major issue is adoption. While there's a whole lot of people who want BEVs, price is still a major concern, as is infrastructure.

Tesla make it dead simple with their supercharger network - find a charger, plug in, fast charging happens. The find a charger thing is integrated into the car, and often has feedback about what chargers are busy or unavailable.

Unfortunately, outside of Europe and the UK, the BEV charging story is pretty terrible.

Volkswagon, who arguably have the biggest incentive to make this work, have a pretty atrocious charging experience in the US, as demonstrated by Engineering Explained[1] with their latest and greatest model the 'ID.4'

Europe and the UK have put down standards and basically forced some level of interoperation between charging network systems, which reduced friction for EV owners.

The other issue is getting dealers onboard. If you're someone for whom an EV might make a whole lot of sense, there's approximately zero chance you're going to get recommended an EV, even if the dealer has one to sell you (either because the dealership dont' keep units to test-drive, or the manufacturer doesn't sell a BEV). Dealers hate them, because there's little to no after-sales servicing requirement. I've seen many stories about people basically having to argue or beg a dealer to let them buy or even order an EV.

Perhaps Manufacturers could go with direct sales a-la Tesla, but there seems to still be a lot of political power left in the dealer networks, so that isn't necessarily going to be possible any time soon.

What will convince me that EVs are here to stay is when dealerships are pushing BEVs right alongside their ICEs.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EotuxCptcM4

Re: Tesla Q1 2021 Results

#254
post #214
post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who never really liked either one (though I did buy a Tesla), Musk is nearly a clone of Jobs in affect and attitude and reality distortion effect. All those people who are SO UPSET about the spin regarding FSD, for example, are just echoing what all us folks on Linux PCs were saying about Macs through the 90's and early 00's. Remember when the Altivec G4 was a Supercomputer on a Chip despite being slower t…

> Musk is nearly a clone of Jobs in affect and attitude and reality distortion effect. Eh, Musk has more negative tendencies than Jobs, especially related to his public behavior and honesty. Whatever you might think of Jobs, whenever he issued a firm statement it came true. iPhones were always released on schedule. Musk is years late and many miles short on almost every product he announces. Full Self Driving was sup…

Not trying to defend Musk, but his goals are orders of magnitudes harder than what Jobs had to face.

Musk is on a mission to Mars and is scared of anything that might delay his ultimate goal.

Re: Tesla Q1 2021 Results

#255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have two separate and (mostly) unrelated feelings. Musk has done something remarkable as you say. At the same time, the market cap is nuts and a portent of doom. Bigger than all car companies combined, by market cap? A market crash could take down Tesla and set back electric car adoption by 20 years.

I think the cat is out of the bag for EVs: enough people have tasted them and wouldn't go back, and enough manufacturers got into the game, that even if Tesla was to fail, enough people would be asking for it, and enough manufacturers would already be advanced enough in their plans to keep the ball rolling. Basically, Tesla's mission is 99% accomplished.

In Europe there is still too few charging facilities.

Basically an EV only makes sense if you own a house and can get your own charger.

The V2 supercharger still needs around 20 minutes for an 80% charge, while the new BMW iX3 needs around 30 minutes for 80%.

The Tesla V3 supercharger is promising, but the killer feature will be a unified charging platform and not one for each car maker.

Re: Tesla Q1 2021 Results

#256
post #214
post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who never really liked either one (though I did buy a Tesla), Musk is nearly a clone of Jobs in affect and attitude and reality distortion effect. All those people who are SO UPSET about the spin regarding FSD, for example, are just echoing what all us folks on Linux PCs were saying about Macs through the 90's and early 00's. Remember when the Altivec G4 was a Supercomputer on a Chip despite being slower t…

> Musk is nearly a clone of Jobs in affect and attitude and reality distortion effect. Eh, Musk has more negative tendencies than Jobs, especially related to his public behavior and honesty. Whatever you might think of Jobs, whenever he issued a firm statement it came true. iPhones were always released on schedule. Musk is years late and many miles short on almost every product he announces. Full Self Driving was sup…

His COVID tweets almost certainly lead to people taking unnecessary risks and dying alone and intubated. Fuck Elon.

Re: Tesla Q1 2021 Results

#257
post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you can buy instead is 99% based on personal preference, I cancelled the model 3 and got a BMW because I liked the few I had before. But my co-founder would never drive a BMW. He returned his second model S and got an Audi EV instead. Which is not a car I would pick. My point is that a model 3 isn't really a luxury car, it's an entry model and has the build quality and options that go with that.

So I don't get this. You bash the Model 3 for build quality but you support BMW which is notorious for having horrible reliability. I'd pick the car with just okay paint and maybe some not-so-perfect gaps over a car that I know is going to cost me thousands in maintenance.

According to ADAC (in german) BMW is pretty good in terms of reliability. https://www.adac.de/rund-ums-fahrzeug/unfall-schaden-panne/a... They do mention battery issues with the BMW 5 series prior to 2010.

Re: Tesla Q1 2021 Results

#258
post #132

Whatever you may think of Tesla and Musk, you have to agree that they've accomplished something rather incredible. Few would have thought this possible not that long ago: * 185K vehicle deliveries in Q1, +109% versus a year ago [a] * 2.7K supercharger stations, +41% versus a year ago * 24.5K supercharger connectors, +44% versus a year ago * 92 MW of solar generation deployed in Q1, +163% versus a year ago * 445 MWh o…

i'm not trying to be snide, but it's worth noting that so much of this is fueled by government subsidies and investments into electric vehicle technology. And the current administration is looking to at least double that investment. Things are going to be great for Tesla, but what happens when the subsidies stop? In a sense, a lot of Ford's growth was fueled by government investment in new roads. Ford kept growing af…

- While government incentives (tax credits) do help electric car adoption, in the US the ran out for Tesla quite some time ago. So the current growth of Tesla in the US is not fueld by incentives. On other markets they do play an important role though.

- Negative incentives (like CO2 taxes) for fossil fuel cars are going to grow.

- Most importantly: battery prices are in a constant downfall. We are quicky approaching the point where electric cars are cheaper to make than fossil fuel cars. In the TCO they can be cheaper already.

Re: Tesla Q1 2021 Results

#259
post #224
post #132

Whatever you may think of Tesla and Musk, you have to agree that they've accomplished something rather incredible. Few would have thought this possible not that long ago: * 185K vehicle deliveries in Q1, +109% versus a year ago [a] * 2.7K supercharger stations, +41% versus a year ago * 24.5K supercharger connectors, +44% versus a year ago * 92 MW of solar generation deployed in Q1, +163% versus a year ago * 445 MWh o…

I had to look it up but for reference in Q1 2021 the big auto makers delivered the following. Ford: 521,334 GM: 642,250 Toyota: 2.46 million VW: 2.5 million If Tesla holds up they'll be larger than Ford in 2 years and be the largest automaker in the world in 4 years.

That assumes the other car manufacturers aren't growing too. Most of the car industry has had their best growth in 1st quarter sales for nearly a decade.

It will be interesting to see Q2 numbers - March sales seemed to be contributing most to the quarterly growth, but the chip shortage may effect production.

Re: Tesla Q1 2021 Results

#260
post #224
post #132

Whatever you may think of Tesla and Musk, you have to agree that they've accomplished something rather incredible. Few would have thought this possible not that long ago: * 185K vehicle deliveries in Q1, +109% versus a year ago [a] * 2.7K supercharger stations, +41% versus a year ago * 24.5K supercharger connectors, +44% versus a year ago * 92 MW of solar generation deployed in Q1, +163% versus a year ago * 445 MWh o…

I had to look it up but for reference in Q1 2021 the big auto makers delivered the following. Ford: 521,334 GM: 642,250 Toyota: 2.46 million VW: 2.5 million If Tesla holds up they'll be larger than Ford in 2 years and be the largest automaker in the world in 4 years.

Tesla cars are not interesting for many customers in EU (except maybe nordic countries), they will go with VW/Audi/BMW or other brands. You can't easily extrapolate the growth from US to EU or other parts of world.
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