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Tesla reports steep drop in profits despite US rush to buy electric vehicles

theguardian.com

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Re: Tesla reports steep drop in profits despite US rush to buy electric vehicles

#71

Post by stunt »

I live in Europe and drive a Tesla, so I occasionally chat with other Tesla owners. Many of them make a point of mentioning that they bought their car years ago and probably wouldn’t have made the same choice if they’d known about Musk’s activities in Europe. Some even seem worried about being judged.

I’m fairly certain that the overall decline in interest is mainly due to general economic uncertainty and the phasing out of EV incentives in various countries. But I’m trying to say that it’s clear that Musk’s reputation has taken a hit! ironically among some of the very demographic groups most likely to be Tesla customers.

Re: Tesla reports steep drop in profits despite US rush to buy electric vehicles

#72

Post by array_key_first »

pfannkuchen wrote: post #70
array_key_first wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't need to constantly change, it's just that yes: they're being outcompeted, and pretty hard. The legacy automakers are fully in the game and everyone now remembers: oh wait, they know how to make cars. Tesla... ehhh Kia, Hyundai, even GM are really giving Tesla a run for their money in every segment.

So maybe it’s just me, but I hate how the legacy auto makers, even the luxury ones, nickel and dime everything. You buy a $75k car and the frequently touched places are metal, but if you go looking at all you find cheap $15k car tier plastic. With Tesla, the entire car is made of a few middle of the road materials. I don’t want the cheap plastic, but I also don’t want a facade. I just want reasonable quality everywhe…

Well it's nice that Tesla cars are uniquely made, but they are very ugly to the average consumer. More traditional cars produced by legacy makers just... look better. To most people.

Legacy makers are producing cars with things consumers actually want. Higher quality interiors, nice exteriors, good ride dynamics, Apple car play, and competitive price points.

I think the reality is that most people actually don't care about Teslas big screen or autopilot. They want a car thats somewhat normal that does car things and does them well. They want good range, comfy seats, and steering wheel stocks.

Kia provides that, Hyundai provide that, pretty much everyone provides that except Tesla. The extra acceleration points doesn't matter. It's never really mattered, that's just a spec sheet bragging point.

Re: Tesla reports steep drop in profits despite US rush to buy electric vehicles

#73

Post by pfannkuchen »

array_key_first wrote: post #72
pfannkuchen wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So maybe it’s just me, but I hate how the legacy auto makers, even the luxury ones, nickel and dime everything. You buy a $75k car and the frequently touched places are metal, but if you go looking at all you find cheap $15k car tier plastic. With Tesla, the entire car is made of a few middle of the road materials. I don’t want the cheap plastic, but I also don’t want a facade. I just want reasonable quality everywhe…

Well it's nice that Tesla cars are uniquely made, but they are very ugly to the average consumer. More traditional cars produced by legacy makers just... look better. To most people. Legacy makers are producing cars with things consumers actually want. Higher quality interiors, nice exteriors, good ride dynamics, Apple car play, and competitive price points. I think the reality is that most people actually don't care…

> Teslas big screen

I am not talking about the size. Capacitive touch screen hardware and software seems to be really difficult to nail. The actual touch interface on Tesla is at the iPad level. Also the material quality is very good.

All other cars I’ve tried recently have all had a touch screen, it was just bad. If I have to have a screen, I want it to feel like a first class citizen and not some cost cut afterthought.

I don’t really get why people would want CarPlay instead of the native Tesla OS? I have another car with CarPlay which was more expensive than my Tesla (so apples to apples or better comparison), and I find CarPlay on the B tier screen to feel extremely clunky by comparison (though still much better than what came before in the legacy makers).

Have you daily driven a Tesla before? Have the other car makers released some crazy breakthrough? I might test drive some, I’m curious now.

It seems to me like the biggest difference is the media turned against Elon, and so we went from having positive coverage of Tesla to negative. I think that alone could explain the sentiment shift, based on how people all around me seem to be brain-led by the media.

Re: Tesla reports steep drop in profits despite US rush to buy electric vehicles

#74

Post by bdangubic »

pfannkuchen wrote: post #73
array_key_first wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well it's nice that Tesla cars are uniquely made, but they are very ugly to the average consumer. More traditional cars produced by legacy makers just... look better. To most people. Legacy makers are producing cars with things consumers actually want. Higher quality interiors, nice exteriors, good ride dynamics, Apple car play, and competitive price points. I think the reality is that most people actually don't care…

> Teslas big screen I am not talking about the size. Capacitive touch screen hardware and software seems to be really difficult to nail. The actual touch interface on Tesla is at the iPad level. Also the material quality is very good. All other cars I’ve tried recently have all had a touch screen, it was just bad. If I have to have a screen, I want it to feel like a first class citizen and not some cost cut afterthou…

one has to be out of their mind to prefer carplay over tesla’s native, literally out of their mind. tesla’s tech is far superior than any other car and it isn’t even close.

the problwm with tesla is that it is a dinosaur. I own 2014 Tesla S, my neighbour latest one - it is same f’ing car. tesla X was cool looking… in 2016, now it looks like it belongs in a museum. model 3 is chopped up S and Y is blown up 3. the cars are sooooo outdated it is nuts people still buy them

Re: Tesla reports steep drop in profits despite US rush to buy electric vehicles

#75

Post by jonway »

pfannkuchen wrote: post #49
jonway wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They also haven’t released a vehicle that is particularly relevant in like 6 years. Yes, the Cybertruck that nobody really wants, and a Model Y with an extended wheelbase. Yay.

Why do things have to change constantly? Like the Model Y was insanely different to any other car I’d ever driven not long ago, and Tesla was first to market on actually good electric cars. Why do they have to operate using the same strategy as legacy auto makers? Like a design refresh every 3 years to drive excitement feels manipulative to me, not like something that is absolutely necessary. Are you saying that comp…

There are plenty of very, very good EV out there, have been for years but those other automakers are already servicing shareholders with pretty reliable profits.

As a result they just treat ev and hybrids like any other model for the most part wrt marketing and so forth. It’s understandable that you wouldn’t want to cannibalize regular sales and service. Financially, they don’t need to. It does help their CAFE fleet standards.

It doesn’t make as much sense for Toyota since they have some of the segment (economical or environmental buyers) covered by Camry and Prius, which they’ve been making for like 30 years.

As for “why should cars change every 3 years”, well, they don’t.

Other automakers typically develop a platform and use it as a base for many models over several to many years.

Mercedes-Benz platforms have lasted over a decade, encompassing many badges. GM make Escalades and Yukons, they are the same platform with different options.

There is a sure benefit of Tesla: competition in the EV space, since they had no product to match GM.

Just an aside, electric cars aren’t even close to new, Tesla was not first to market. They were pretty popular 120 years ago, but clearly things change.

Re: Tesla reports steep drop in profits despite US rush to buy electric vehicles

#76

Post by jonway »

bdangubic wrote: post #74
pfannkuchen wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Teslas big screen I am not talking about the size. Capacitive touch screen hardware and software seems to be really difficult to nail. The actual touch interface on Tesla is at the iPad level. Also the material quality is very good. All other cars I’ve tried recently have all had a touch screen, it was just bad. If I have to have a screen, I want it to feel like a first class citizen and not some cost cut afterthou…

one has to be out of their mind to prefer carplay over tesla’s native, literally out of their mind. tesla’s tech is far superior than any other car and it isn’t even close. the problwm with tesla is that it is a dinosaur. I own 2014 Tesla S, my neighbour latest one - it is same f’ing car. tesla X was cool looking… in 2016, now it looks like it belongs in a museum. model 3 is chopped up S and Y is blown up 3. the cars…

Tesla is married to the designs because of the way that they’re manufactured.

For example Tesla uses a very large press to make the Y monocoque body in one or two pieces. They get a lot of their manufacturing capability this way, reducing assembly costs and weld time, but then they do weird stuff like bolting the control are inside the passenger wheel well interior under the carpet. This kind of stuff isn’t replicable , each vehicle is for the most part a siloed manufacturing process

This is fine for a one off model, but now the manufacturing process is bespoke across the board. Any other maker can switch out parts of the line and make a different vehicle, Tesla needs to redesign the process, supply new assemblies, get another Gigafactory Press from Idra Group, and then retrain everybody. So they don’t.

Instead you get Full Self Driving.

Pretty much every Tesla product has been seen more than a decade ago (cybertruck was first discussed in think 2014) except the Semi, which doesn’t exist, but had lots of press regardless.

Re: Tesla reports steep drop in profits despite US rush to buy electric vehicles

#77

Post by pfannkuchen »

bdangubic wrote: post #74
pfannkuchen wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Teslas big screen I am not talking about the size. Capacitive touch screen hardware and software seems to be really difficult to nail. The actual touch interface on Tesla is at the iPad level. Also the material quality is very good. All other cars I’ve tried recently have all had a touch screen, it was just bad. If I have to have a screen, I want it to feel like a first class citizen and not some cost cut afterthou…

one has to be out of their mind to prefer carplay over tesla’s native, literally out of their mind. tesla’s tech is far superior than any other car and it isn’t even close. the problwm with tesla is that it is a dinosaur. I own 2014 Tesla S, my neighbour latest one - it is same f’ing car. tesla X was cool looking… in 2016, now it looks like it belongs in a museum. model 3 is chopped up S and Y is blown up 3. the cars…

I get what you’re saying, but I feel like this is basically an immoral reason to judge a car. Immoral in the philosophical sense, not in a religious sense.

Like do we really need our cars to have random shapes added and removed from them every 3 years? Why? Sure, novelty feels good, but the impact of this behavior is pretty clearly not positive. A lot of waste is generated, both at a societal level but also at a personal and familial level, and also in terms of industrial production resource direction, basically in the name of fashion. The new BMW design isn’t any “better” than the old design, it’s just visual social memes.

So anyway it makes sense that Elon is being stubborn against this, and it also makes sense that he will probably fail at doing that because not everyone is a turbo autist.

Re: Tesla reports steep drop in profits despite US rush to buy electric vehicles

#78

Post by array_key_first »

bdangubic wrote: post #74
pfannkuchen wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Teslas big screen I am not talking about the size. Capacitive touch screen hardware and software seems to be really difficult to nail. The actual touch interface on Tesla is at the iPad level. Also the material quality is very good. All other cars I’ve tried recently have all had a touch screen, it was just bad. If I have to have a screen, I want it to feel like a first class citizen and not some cost cut afterthou…

one has to be out of their mind to prefer carplay over tesla’s native, literally out of their mind. tesla’s tech is far superior than any other car and it isn’t even close. the problwm with tesla is that it is a dinosaur. I own 2014 Tesla S, my neighbour latest one - it is same f’ing car. tesla X was cool looking… in 2016, now it looks like it belongs in a museum. model 3 is chopped up S and Y is blown up 3. the cars…

> one has to be out of their mind to prefer carplay over tesla’s native, literally out of their mind.

Hi, it's me, I've driven Tesla's and yes - I prefer carplay and android auto, and I have good reasons for it.

The first being that touch displays, even if they are the best displays that could be manufactured on Earth, will always be inferior to physical controls for many functions.

Me swiping up and down or pushing plus or minus to turn up the heat does not compare to a rinky dink dial found in a 1999 Toyota Corolla.

So then, what's left? The software-only stuff: navigation, music, notifications.

I think CarPlay and Android Auto does all of those better. Navigation is best on Google Maps and Apple Maps. And, even if you disagree, just have ONE app to do it across the board and share the data is a superior experience.

But, even if you're still not convinced, consider: your phone is 500 - 1000 dollars, and your car is tens of thousands of dollars. Why are you tightly coupling these throw-away software functions to such an expensive thing?

What happens if, tomorrow, some service goes away and your Tesla doesn't update? Then you'd be like those bozos who bought a fancy SiriusXM subscription in their 2015 car.

Re: Tesla reports steep drop in profits despite US rush to buy electric vehicles

#79

Post by jonway »

scarab92 wrote: post #51
jonway wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They also haven’t released a vehicle that is particularly relevant in like 6 years. Yes, the Cybertruck that nobody really wants, and a Model Y with an extended wheelbase. Yay.

The Model Y has been iteratively improved since its introduction like any other product, and remains the best selling car in its class in most western markets. This argument makes about as much sense as saying Apple hasn’t released a new phone since 2007.

Model Y got like 2-3kwh more battery capacity, nearly every iPhone is a totally new model.

Re: Tesla reports steep drop in profits despite US rush to buy electric vehicles

#80

Post by jonway »

plqbfbv wrote: post #55
jonway wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They also haven’t released a vehicle that is particularly relevant in like 6 years. Yes, the Cybertruck that nobody really wants, and a Model Y with an extended wheelbase. Yay.

What does particularly relevant mean? [lets set aside the CT, agree) They lost a lot of the advantage they had on hardware, but if you want a non-chinese EV with really good software and well-thought and working UX they're still a perfectly valid all-rounder with a very good charging network, and they also refine their hardware over time. They refreshed the M3 and MY looks recently and changed the shapes a bit, but I…

I really said relevant new model in order to gloss over cybertruck, which is largely not
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