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GM scales back partnership with electric truck startup Nikola

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Re: GM scales back partnership with electric truck startup Nikola

#91

Post by muststopmyths »

Cactus2018 wrote: post #15
lumost wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.architecturendesign.net/ins... The market can only price accurately if all participants are rational or at the very least are on average rational. As the effective number of participants falls and the need for those participants to make rational economic decisions falls, were likely to see more weworks, theranos, and nikolas. Wait until we see someone buy multiple city blocks of Manha…

Would love to see photos of the indoor tennis court in its prime. I'm surprised property taxes never caught up with that mansion!?

>Would love to see photos of the indoor tennis court in its prime.

OTOH you couldn't pay me to spend a night in the same room with that creepy doll !

Re: GM scales back partnership with electric truck startup Nikola

#92

Post by mwfunk »

I know it's petty but literally the fact that it was named Nikola was reason enough for anyone to think they're shady or uninspired or a straight up scam. I would be equally skeptical about wannabe Apple competitors named Banana or Dragonfruit, or a Microsoft competitor named Megahard, or a Burger King competitor named Hamburger Aristocrat. If the best someone can come up with for their own name is a joke pointed at their primary competitor, it does not inspire confidence.

Re: GM scales back partnership with electric truck startup Nikola

#93

Post by Akababa »

omarforgotpwd wrote: post #80
gruez wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Trevor told Jonny Robb to stop posting about his behavior towards women, and in exchange he would give him $500,000. IANAL, but how is that not entrapment? Or even if it wasn't entrapment, how is it different than signing a NDA/non-disparagement contract? >possession of a controlled substance (weed + mushrooms in his car) okay that's just dumb.

because Trevor told the police that Jonny had told him "give me money or i'm going to post untrue information about you to ruin your reputation". The info turned out to be true, which makes me doubt him recounting that Jonny brought up the idea of a pay off.

So Trevor fabricated evidence to fool the police? That's a far more serious offense than the sexual misconduct, and frankly it's hard to believe he could pull that off, unless he managed to bribe the police. Johnny's probably not completely innocent - they can both be scumbags.

Re: GM scales back partnership with electric truck startup Nikola

#94

Post by neilfrndes »

mwfunk wrote: post #92

I know it's petty but literally the fact that it was named Nikola was reason enough for anyone to think they're shady or uninspired or a straight up scam. I would be equally skeptical about wannabe Apple competitors named Banana or Dragonfruit, or a Microsoft competitor named Megahard, or a Burger King competitor named Hamburger Aristocrat. If the best someone can come up with for their own name is a joke pointed at…

Well, Whole Foods used to be SaferWay (Spoof of SafeWay).

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whole_Foods_Market

Re: GM scales back partnership with electric truck startup Nikola

#95

Post by zwily »

zaptheimpaler wrote: post #73
MattGaiser wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they still committed engineering and corporate resources, even if just to do planning and run estimates. I get that it is not a lot in the grand scheme of things for them, but it went quite far if the scam was so obvious. Or can I get a meeting with GM with an animator and mockups?

Nikola is still worth $10B on the market, after today's crash. GM got an 11% stake. i.e they just made $1B, atleast. Probably much more. Yes that's worth a couple of pointless meetings and work for GM.

The deal is off. GM got no stake, AIUI.

Re: GM scales back partnership with electric truck startup Nikola

#96

Post by Thorrez »

belval wrote: post #83
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some states are what is known as "all party consent" states, while others are "one party consent" states. In all party consent states, it is illegal to record a private conversation unless everyone who is being recorded is aware and has consented to being recorded. In one party consent states (which are the majority of states), only one person (presumably the person doing the recording) needs to be aware of and conse…

I think your missed the point of the comment you were replying to. Why would we on HN, care about whether or not the recording was legal?

I think it's interesting to know whether someone is breaking the law for the sake of a HN comment.

Additionally, people might want to copy this person's behavior, and it would be useful to know whether the behavior is legal or not before doing so.

Re: GM scales back partnership with electric truck startup Nikola

#98

Post by jariel »

55555 wrote: post #84
jariel wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"From GM's perspective they stood to lose nothing and potentially gain. " No, investing 2 Billion in a scam essentially ruins the credibility of many people and puts the CEO in jeopardy. Being stupid has consequences, even if you can back out. "The big banks, the suppliers, the big corporate entities GM has to deal with don't care " Of course they care - you think that the suppliers of GM who give GM massive credit w…

You don't understand the structure of the deal. GM risks nothing and has upside.

I understand the structure of the deal - you're not understanding credibility, power and money.

Doing a $2B deal with a company that turned out to be hot air / fraud is inexcusable, total incompetence - it doesn't matter how well leveraged GM was ostensibly, or how de-risked they were.

If it was a 'side show' M&A project, the CEO could write it off, but it's not - EV's are 'the core' part of the future of automakers and they are scrambling to put a strategy in place.

Everyone involved in this fiasco to go, they need someone in place who can put the EV roadmap in place.

There was ample evidence that NKLA was a mess, and GM bit anyhow.

This deal should be a be 'Tesla Buy' signal, because it validates Musks' view that regular automakers are stupid.

And just gasp at how badly markets are out of whack - a $10B company that has no money, a string of failures, they've produced nothing for the investment, shenanigans with investors bailing out etc..

In reality NKLA is probably worth some large negative value.

Re: GM scales back partnership with electric truck startup Nikola

#99

Post by jariel »

zaptheimpaler wrote: post #73
MattGaiser wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they still committed engineering and corporate resources, even if just to do planning and run estimates. I get that it is not a lot in the grand scheme of things for them, but it went quite far if the scam was so obvious. Or can I get a meeting with GM with an animator and mockups?

Nikola is still worth $10B on the market, after today's crash. GM got an 11% stake. i.e they just made $1B, atleast. Probably much more. Yes that's worth a couple of pointless meetings and work for GM.

No, GM called off the deal, even if they got some amount, they'd never be able to liquidate, the selloff would crash NKLA instantly. It's going to go down eventually.

I don't think HNers here are grasping how bad it is for a respectable multinational like GM to get taken in a major deal like this, it's bad.

Re: GM scales back partnership with electric truck startup Nikola

#100

Post by zrobotics »

frogpelt wrote: post #52
freeone3000 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GE still holds that trademark, from when it was founded (as Edison General Electric).

Well they need to make electric cars then.

Well, GE was making chargers for electric cars in 1914,so...

http://www.american-automobiles.com/images2/1914-General-Ele...

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