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Tesla Was Cash Flow Positive Last Week, CEO Musk Says

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Re: Tesla Was Cash Flow Positive Last Week, CEO Musk Says

#121

Post by sukuriant »

omni wrote: post #114
w1ntermute wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The range on the top-of-the-line Model S is 300, not 200, miles. And with Superchargers, it's no longer just a toy.

In the very limited areas where there is currently Supercharger coverage. Also, 30 minutes for a charge isn't exactly fast.

It's fast enough for most needs. If you're traveling across country, a 30 minute break every 5 hours might be just what the doctor ordered. If you break apart your eating times just right, you can have it coincide with eating times.

If charge time were reduced to 30 minutes in the general case for electric cars, I'd be much, much more likely to consider them a viable alternative to my current car. We just need the infrastructure. Honestly, I believe that the car that's going to win the transition race is going to be the one that acquires the infrastructure the most quickly, be it electric fast-charging stations, hydrogen refineries/pumping stations, electrically-charged gel stations, or whatever thing we end up thinking up.

Re: Tesla Was Cash Flow Positive Last Week, CEO Musk Says

#122

Post by el_cuadrado »

toddmorey wrote: post #117
el_cuadrado wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is assuming BMW et all stop any innovation. But they won't. They will offer an electric vehicle the moment it becomes feasible (and I am sorry but 200 miles range is still an exciting and expensive toy).

Totally disagree. While not at gasoline car levels, Tesla has certainly passed the 'toy' mark in range. What's the range on a 5 series tank? 500 miles or so? 300 miles is more than enough to cover my daily needs at least. I imagine it is for most people, unless you fill up more than once every two days.

Yes, if you do not travel, it is a perfect car.

I would not take Tesla on my camping trip, or my ski trip, or my ~700 miles road trip. And I honestly do not want a car I cannot use outside of my commute.

Re: Tesla Was Cash Flow Positive Last Week, CEO Musk Says

#123

Post by CamperBob2 »

jlgreco wrote: post #99
yid wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great comment, thank you. I'd just like to add that the "frunk" isn't new -- I've been stashing my gym bag in my Porsche 911's frunk for years (it's a rear-engined car). Edit: While I absolutely live the Model S, I can assure you that exceeding stalwarts of the 5-series category, like the BMW M5, will not be as easy to disrupt as the market the Model S aims for.

Does Porsche call it a "frunk" too? I can't stand that word, it's cute, but awful. Sounds like a word I might use to describe a particularly pungent cheese.

Agreed, it's almost as annoying a word as "blog," and look how that one caught on. :(

Re: Tesla Was Cash Flow Positive Last Week, CEO Musk Says

#124

Post by temphn »

ikono wrote: post #116
temphn wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would argue it is possible to believe both that Tesla is a great company and that Romney was generally right in that many of the green investments have indeed been losers (Solyndra, A123, Beacon Power, Abound Solar, ...). Lest we forget, Romney is/was a pretty great investor and entrepreneur himself, just like Elon Musk. It's unfortunate that Romney included Tesla in his list of green losers - he did start this fig…

I don't really think you can evaluate government loans the same way you would as a private investor. The federal government has defacto senior equity in every company that is incorporated and/or operates in the US. As a private investor the only upside you get from a loan is the interest. It's not even entirely fair to use a VC type model here as the government will also reap rewards from companies that indirectly be…

  I don't really think you can evaluate government loans the 
  same way you would as a private investor.
So, there are different ways to isolate a core philosophical disagreement but I think this may be one of them. In a different context you will hear people say that "the government is not a household" because the USG can print money. OK, so call that one point of view.

Another point of view looks at the largest and most successful companies (like Apple, Google, et alia) and compares them to the smallest countries (like Iceland). Interestingly, you can do the math to see that Iceland gets about $5.6B of tax revenue with a population of 320,000, while Apple makes $156B with an employee base of about 73,000. This indicates that Apple is about 120X more efficient in terms of dollars generated per person; indeed, significantly more so in that tax payments are more on the involuntary side while Apple purchases are more on the voluntary side.

You can extend the same kind of analysis to Fortune 500 companies and many small countries. This is a very interesting exercise because no one disputes that the Fortune 500 companies can be evaluated by private investors, or that the countries have flags, fiscal policies, and the like. And yet the former outperform the latter by a lot on metrics like this.

So, that's the point of view that says that governments should be evaluated in the same way you'd evaluate companies. One not-so-bad way to think of it is that a citizen is buying a huge package of goods from the government, like cable bundling on steroids, and can only switch service providers by moving.

But, in any case, because we disagree on that point we'll probably also disagree on others. For example, the senior equity thing...are you stating the USG can exercise eminent domain and/or nationalize a company at will? I agree that in practice they have done this, but I at least don't believe this is a good thing.

Anyway, yeah, that's the crux of it: one group does not believe governments should be judged like companies, another group believes they should. Hopefully you can at least see our point of view even if you don't decide to convert :)

Re: Tesla Was Cash Flow Positive Last Week, CEO Musk Says

#125

Post by el_cuadrado »

calinet6 wrote: post #118
el_cuadrado wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is assuming BMW et all stop any innovation. But they won't. They will offer an electric vehicle the moment it becomes feasible (and I am sorry but 200 miles range is still an exciting and expensive toy).

This is like saying that Sony can make an mp3 player, so the iPod isn't competitive in that market. Or that a 5GB iPod won't hold enough music, so it's just an expensive toy. Within 5-10 years the battery problem will improve, especially if there is demand. This is technology, not automotive development. We're not in Detroit anymore. They're in a different class. Tesla is set up to do it right from the start at a muc…

Main function of a car is to move a group of people from point A to point B. Tesla is getting good at it, provided point A and point B are not too far apart, and pint B has an electric charger available. And that is a pretty critical limitation so far.

Jumping on your slightly irrelevant analogies, it is like iPod 5 with a batter that can only hold charge for 30 minutes, and can only charged at Apple store.

Re: Tesla Was Cash Flow Positive Last Week, CEO Musk Says

#126

Post by ikono »

twoodfin wrote: post #85
cadlin wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ford received a loan that was an order of magnitude larger than what Tesla received. You're arguing from your biases and not from facts.

Good point. https://lpo.energy.gov/?page_id=43 I'm confused by the criteria described at the bottom of the page: In order to be financially eligible for an ATVM loan, an applicant must be financially viable without the receipt of additional federal funding for the proposed project. Would Tesla really have been financially viable without this loan?

I think their powertrain business has always been profitable. It just would have taken a lot longer to build up to the point they are now.

Re: Tesla Was Cash Flow Positive Last Week, CEO Musk Says

#127

Post by el_cuadrado »

dave1619 wrote: post #103
el_cuadrado wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is assuming BMW et all stop any innovation. But they won't. They will offer an electric vehicle the moment it becomes feasible (and I am sorry but 200 miles range is still an exciting and expensive toy).

BMW will surely innovate in some regards, no question. But the real issue is if they can keep up with Tesla and disrupt their own 3 Series market. BMW is likely not to release or innovate on a new product that will cannibalize their main source of income (3 series sales). They're probably incrementally try to improve the 3 Series. And they'll release sub-par electric cars like the i3 and i8 ( http://www.bmw-i-usa.com…

BMW has been making ActivE (all-electric 1 series) for a while now. They are not released to general public because, well, the technology is not good enough yet - and BMW is not under pressure of bankruptcy.

Re: Tesla Was Cash Flow Positive Last Week, CEO Musk Says

#128

Post by ryanhuff »

calinet6 wrote: post #118
el_cuadrado wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is assuming BMW et all stop any innovation. But they won't. They will offer an electric vehicle the moment it becomes feasible (and I am sorry but 200 miles range is still an exciting and expensive toy).

This is like saying that Sony can make an mp3 player, so the iPod isn't competitive in that market. Or that a 5GB iPod won't hold enough music, so it's just an expensive toy. Within 5-10 years the battery problem will improve, especially if there is demand. This is technology, not automotive development. We're not in Detroit anymore. They're in a different class. Tesla is set up to do it right from the start at a muc…

Its a bit presumptuous to say that Tesla is so different. Sure, they are attractive at the moment because of unique niche they are filling. If BMW, Mercedes, Audi, Lexus, Acura, etc all sold an all-electric vehicle with similar range, Tesla's differentiation becomes much less unique, and normal competitive factors come into play (scale, marketing, etc).

Re: Tesla Was Cash Flow Positive Last Week, CEO Musk Says

#129

Post by ryanhuff »

fghh45sdfhr3 wrote: post #104
dave1619 wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

BMW will surely innovate in some regards, no question. But the real issue is if they can keep up with Tesla and disrupt their own 3 Series market. BMW is likely not to release or innovate on a new product that will cannibalize their main source of income (3 series sales). They're probably incrementally try to improve the 3 Series. And they'll release sub-par electric cars like the i3 and i8 ( http://www.bmw-i-usa.com…

The fact that most of the time market leaders resist cannibalizing the main source of their income is well known. The reasons are complex and connected to the nature of large human organizations. And it is also why most truly disruptive innovation is driven by smaller companies.

Automobile manufacturers already offer petrol and diesel engine vehicles. How is this any different from a cannibalization perspective?

Re: Tesla Was Cash Flow Positive Last Week, CEO Musk Says

#130

Post by w1ntermute »

omni wrote: post #114
w1ntermute wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The range on the top-of-the-line Model S is 300, not 200, miles. And with Superchargers, it's no longer just a toy.

In the very limited areas where there is currently Supercharger coverage. Also, 30 minutes for a charge isn't exactly fast.

Musk has said he plans to blanket the country with Superchargers in the next few years, so that is just a matter of time. Remember that it took decades before we had gas stations all across the country.
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