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Canoo spent double its annual revenue on the CEO's private jet

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Re: Canoo spent double its annual revenue on the CEO's private jet

#221

Post by acdha »

drexlspivey wrote: post #198
acdha wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He’s buying air travel from himself. Unless he’s undercutting the commercial carriers, that means the company is spending more than it needs to with the difference going to his pockets. It’d be much cleaner ethically for him to get reimbursed the cost of a business class ticket and pay for his jet out of pocket if he can’t abide flying with the little people.

If the company requires a private jet they can either pay for a lease from some other vendor or pay the CEO to lease his jet. Unless they are paying way above market price I don't see how this is embezzlment or even fishy.

They’re losing money, which seems like a time not to spend money on luxuries.

Re: Canoo spent double its annual revenue on the CEO's private jet

#222

Post by wkat4242 »

dmoy wrote: post #118
Solvency wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can someone explain why people try to make new cars from the ground up, rather than "fork" a base platform from GM/Toyota/KIA/whoever with a different design and little features? This happens in literally every other market and industry. hell, just look at PCs and laptops. Like why can't a Canoo or Rivian license a base EV platform and come up with their own chassis design, infotainment system, and other little thing…

People do fork. Tesla's original was a fork of a Lotus. They got the whole chassis/etc from Lotus, dropped in their own drive train and other stuff. Other reply mentioned paccar. Idk why it doesn't happen more often. I suspect most manufacturers aren't willing to license like that.

That wasn't really a fork, they didn't copy the design, they actually bought the chassis from lotus. It's not really that different from a manufacturer buying brakes or wheels from another supplier.

Re: Canoo spent double its annual revenue on the CEO's private jet

#223

Post by wkat4242 »

efnx wrote: post #27
Workaccount2 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A former president only stayed at properties owned by his company, billing the government millions in extra overhead. His voters love him.

And they say “if you don’t like it, leave!”. And so now we live in New Zealand.

New Zealand is the most amazing country I've ever visited. Scenery wise, but also super nice people and politically sane (Andern in particular was great, too bad she left)

I'd live there too if it wasn't literally on the other side of the planet for me and I don't want to cause hundreds of tons of CO2 every time I want to see my family :'(

Re: Canoo spent double its annual revenue on the CEO's private jet

#224

Post by snakeyjake »

rrrrrrrrrrrryan wrote: post #214
bombcar wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First class flights are completely different from potato class, and private jets are so far above first class it's really hard to exactly explain how much.

Yeah I don't think people realize that flying private means you don't have to go through security. You don't even have to go into the airport. You just drive up and walk onto the plane. For executives in a tight race with hundreds of millions of dollars on the line, where a schedule slipping even 1 day can matter, sometimes flying private does actually make financial sense.

>For executives in a tight race with hundreds of millions of dollars on the line, where a schedule slipping even 1 day can matter, sometimes flying private does actually make financial sense.

I'm not an executive.

I would never disgrace my ancestors or embarrass my descendants by getting an MBA.

But I have been around the block a few times and if you're in a situation where missing a flight will torpedo a "hundred million dollar" deal you're a shitty businessperson.

It has been my experience that the best way to keep a schedule from slipping is for executives to keep their mouths shut, cloistered in their office, waiting for an assistant to build some slides for them.

Re: Canoo spent double its annual revenue on the CEO's private jet

#225

Post by eszed »

lanstein wrote: post #103
eszed wrote: post #24

I slightly mis-read the headline. Here's what's going on: >Canoo reimburses Aquila Family Ventures, an entity owned by the CEO, for use of an aircraft. In 2023, Canoo spent $1.7 million on this reimbursement. CEO owns a plane. CEO uses the plane (for business, one presumes). Business reimburses CEO for plane. That looks like a poor use of funds, but not necessarily self-dealing? I mean, in their position he should pr…

Can you tell me what travel system allows that?

I've had that in academia, and in my current (medium-sized) company, where rules and processes aren't as stringent as I know they are in BigCorps. My partner works for a consultancy firm (where she, in part, arranges travel for various people), and they do that too. I guess I assumed that (very fair-seeming) practice is more widespread than it actually is. My condolences to all of you.

Edit: I just remembered a totally silly travel situation during my academic career. The school sent me to an academic conference in an interesting location, and I wanted to stay for an extra week to do some touristing. (It was during summer vacation, and golly do I miss those.)

No one had any problem with it, and they told me standard practice was for me to call the airline and pay the $250 (or whatever it was) change fee. No problem, until I noticed that tickets with the new return date would be something like $400 less than the original dates. No tickets had yet been purchased, so I suggested that they buy me those dates directly: everyone would win.

Except... "Sorry, we can't do that." Huh? "Travel must be +/- 2 days of the conference dates."

I presented the situation to my department chair, hoping for an intervention, but she sighed, and said that those people were impossible to deal with. "But, it's the end of the fiscal year, and I have some extra budget [somewhere], so submit a reimbursement form for the $250, and I'll sign it."

Silly, right?

Re: Canoo spent double its annual revenue on the CEO's private jet

#226

Post by jmholla »

ifyoubuildit wrote: post #95
bevekspldnw wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regular reminder his voters are the minority and he’s never won a popular vote.

I have no interest in defending the man, but this argument triggers me. Do you also make sure to regularly remind people that those football players with Superbowl rings never won the world series? Edit: the point is that the win condition is electoral votes. A rational actor will optimize for that, potentially at the expense of the popular vote even, and they will be more likely to win for it. In other words, don't…

A better analogy would be the ProBowl, not a different sport, in my opinion.

Re: Canoo spent double its annual revenue on the CEO's private jet

#227

Post by brandall10 »

ricardobeat wrote: post #52
brandall10 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s also worth noting the projected revenue for 2024 is 50-100M.

I also project earning $20M from my yet-to-be-built SaaS platform in 2025.

Okay. This is a publicly traded company with a product burning through a multiple of that annually.

Re: Canoo spent double its annual revenue on the CEO's private jet

#228

Post by bombcar »

ghaff wrote: post #212
yread wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a concern for the tax payers if company is paying it as expense and deducting it from taxes instead of paying it as (taxed) salary and him doing what he wants with his money. Don't you have rules what can be expensed in the US?

Certainly there are rules. I would speculate that deducting a private jet flight used for business probably doesn't run afoul of those rules however.

And personal use is accounted for (if paid by the company) and remanded as salary/perks.

I even got affected by that at a restaurant I worked at; they fed us and we got a small "virtual" payment that would show up on our taxes for that meal.

Re: Canoo spent double its annual revenue on the CEO's private jet

#229

Post by koonsolo »

blackhawkC17 wrote: post #26

If the reimbursements were solely for corporate travel, it might not be a concern. The CEO here sold his previous company for $6.5 billion [1], so he already owned the jet before starting Canoo. The company reimburses him for corporate travel on it. What's concerning is that Canoo is stacking big losses and living on the edge...it seems like excessive spending for a company that hasn't even made a dime of profit. But…

When you own a company, the question is always how to get money out. Renting out personal things to the company is one way of doing that.

If you are the sole owner, that's all fine.

If there are co-owners, that shouldn't be done unless everyone gets some benefits.

I once worked for a company that went bust. It wasn't able to pay its suppliers anymore, but alway paid rent on time. Guess who owned the building.

So especially when your company is doing bad, any money you get out is money they cannot take away.

Re: Canoo spent double its annual revenue on the CEO's private jet

#230

Post by Solvency »

ewhanley wrote: post #143
Solvency wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there isn't a single electric vehicle on the market that looks anything like the international scout, FJ40, or any classic rugged vehicle. Look at how much icon4x4 restorations go for. There are wealthy people out there with great taste, but no big auto manufacturer seems to want to produce a chassis with this aesthetic. So why wouldn't Ford or GM be cool with letting a smaller label do this and testing the market?

It's a niche market. I love Icon's stuff but they sell very low numbers of vehicles. I would love to have an ev FJ40 or Scout, but I'm skeptical the general populace wants these as much as enthusiasts think they do.

I find this take to be so outrageously wrong. Do you think the public "wants" the new hummer? Do you think they want any of the garrish looking cars that are literally all over the roads? People will literally buy anything and everything that's put out there as the numbers have proven time and time again. This is what brands and marketing does. It shapes public opinion and public perception. There are countless generic, soulless, lifeless car bodies being sold every day. and icon can't put out big numbers because there's numericallyonly so many of those vintage cars left to restore, and they are a small operation.
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