How do you even come up with this kind of mental garbage?
Do you also not fly Boeing because they are directly related to killing countless of civilians across the planet, including two nuclear weapons drops on populated cities by their B-29s?
Tesla's build quality is closer to the kind of $50 Android phone you find on wish.com than it is to Apple's. I have no idea how Bloomberg clickbait articles end up on here so often, but this particular one is a new low - an article about VW that they've shoehorned both Tesla and Apple into for the clicks.
Not to mention this belies a misunderstanding of Apple's business model. Tesla owns 80% of the electric car market and makes zero profit. That sounds an awful lot like Android's place in the market (72% market share, 30% of profit share) [1] Samsung only has 17% profit share - nobody else makes any money.
Apple's always owned the entirety of the profit in the entire global smartphone space.
I'm more curious how investment of carbon credits (the only source of profit) which are soon to no longer be required by their competitors, in speculative bubbles (e.g. Bitcoin) which are primarily fueled by Chinese coal plants is accounted for. I'd love to have coffee with their Master of Coin.
Sounds like there could have been a coal decrease. That's not a great argument IMO as they have been investing heavily in alternative energy production, especially hydro and solar. Coal usage needs to go down to zero, and anything that impedes that process is maddening to see.
It's recognized by investors who try to make an honest assessment in order to make good investment decisions. Thankfully, this is not a popularity contest.
By any reasonable non-pedantic measure, Tesla has actually been quite profitable over the last couple of years. They've put their entire profit towards building additional production capacity. Of course, they've also used the current investment climate to make capital raises that are bigger than their profits.
IIRC, Tesla have reported profit and cashflow minus capital spending for the last few years, and these numbers show what you expect: A business that's very profitable from a per-unit perspective.
The market cap is a different question, but let's treat that as a separate question.
I had a short infatuation with Audis (VW) until I owned them. My S5 got hauled off by Carvana on Monday and my wife's SQ5 just got traded in on a Ford yesterday.
Fit and finish was impeccable and certainly better than Tesla's, but they were constantly breaking in ridiculous ways. My advice, never ever own one outside of warranty unless it's >20 years old and you can wrench on it yourself.
For VWs, it's always the electrical systems.... If it's 10 years old, I can almost guarantee it's going to have problems. With that said, you'll always see the rouge 1999 Jetta tooling around town, and either the owner got really lucky, or they've worked on it.
Sister in law had a ~’04 Jetta. Mechanically it was sound, but it did have a continuous stream of electrical problems. My nephew had an ‘09 CC that blew a fuel pump and then blew up an engine. Nice car otherwise.
The only car we've had that had electrical problems was a Toyota - where the instruments would keep cutting out. Turns out this was caused by the sunroof...
Edit: Sunroof leaked, water collected at lowest point inside car where Toyota had decided to locate electrical connectors that fed the instruments.
Our B5 Passat (as new) had a superior features/interior quality/fit and finish than my Toyota Corolla but guess which one spent the most time at the dealer not for regular servicing ???.
2 x coil packs,
Tie end rods,
Vacuum pipe to the intake manifold,
A/C heat exchanger.
They are showroom queens. I loved sitting in the stitched suede seats of the RS7 and making vroom sounds while my wallet was getting shredded in service.
What are you smoking? Apple has had a ton of problems with quality on their recent airpods max launch, widely documented. Also remember the apple butterfly switch keyboard fiasco?? Sony has much better quality than Apple right now.
Not that I’ve given it tons of thought, but Tesla seems more like the Motorola (thinking of the razr in particular here in that both seem to be more status symbols than anything) to some future innovators on the horizon.
Out of anyone, Nissan I think has a better chance to become a dominant EV player, they've got a decade of experience with the LEAF. They were running a bit behind, but Ariya looks a lot more mature than the id.4.
The thing is EV for the masses needs a price point that more closely competes with ICE (even if with a shorter range). The US centric 'luxury' EV will always be marginal in other cost-sensitive markets.
I do think Nissan's know-how will play a role but much more likely that the actual sales numbers will come from the Alliance's more agressive cost-cutting brands like Renault or even Dacia.
That might be Tesla's biggest value contribution, building and forcing others to build charging infrastructure. Doesn't necessarily have to be the OEM. Right now no car company is running fuel stations nor are oil companies building cars.
But no manufacturer including Tesla seems to know how to make EVs profitable outside the extended luxury segment. Lower end EV like id.3 are basically the cheapest viable way to attach wheels and seats to the battery pack that doesn't completely ruin the brand. It's not a bad thing, ICE have grown quite wasteful in terms of "how expensive can you make a light switch?", but the price math is very different from ICE.
Previously it was "we want to take $X from the customer who buys the car, what can we cram into the package so that they feel they got something appropriate in return?", whereas for EV it's more liked "the battery is $X, $X+$tiny is the highest we could possibly demand, we need to find the least embarrassing car we can build around that battery for $tiny". Tesla's innovation was starting EV at the luxury end of the market, all previous attempts were doing the opposite. Compared to that all other Tesla innovations are insignificant, no matter how big they are on their own.
Personally, I expect a lot from smaller, entry level EVs based on existing ICE platforms. They can be built on the same lines as their ICE cousins, share a lot of common parts and cheaper to develop. Switching to higher volumes will come at the expense of their ICE cousins, so capacity at the factory isn't much of an issue neither. Higher volumes should also make them cheaper, the EVs, due to economies of scale.
Sure, that's no dedicated EV platform. But who really cares for cars one size class smaller than a Golf, or the same?
ICE power trains can be about as cheap to manufacture as 50 miles worth of battery. Reusing ICE designs and manufacturing won't introduce cheaper electrics, it would introduce more expensive electrics.
You would think so, but Toyota has TWO decades of experience with the Prius, and yet Tesla kicks both of their butts. Still.
And I know it’s still fashionable to bash Tesla on HN (Tesla is one of the few companies still pursuing customer-owned self-driving capability even after the overall hype curve has peaked and they haven’t yet reached their goal, so they get lots of grief for that, some of which is understandable), but their electric car offerings are head and shoulders above anyone else still. I’m looking forward to more competition that actually meets Tesla’s level of performance, maybe Rivian (when will they deliver?) or Lucid. The other pure electric cars on the market especially in the US are like toys in comparison (although still can be good value and better than conventional cars).
VW I hope will have a good showing, though. Still no one is really pursuing a good charging network solution that is seamless & practical like Tesla’s.
Disagree. VW and Tesla have been doing EV for almost as long or longer. And since then have made far, far more investment into it then Nissan.
Just doing basically 1 car not updating it much and then not doing anything for many years while losing many billions at same time, is literally the exact opposite of being in a great position.
The Ariya is their first car after a long time and based on all the reviews I have seen it has not blown anybodies mind.
Overall Nissan volume are small and they are nowhere near as deep in terms of battery supply chain as Tesla or VW.
One has to look at the sales of Non-Tesla EVs. You can get a lightly used Chevrolet BoltEV for USD $15,000. That is absolute collapse of the value. People get angry at Traditional Car companies when they put most of these models on limited, but look at the Sales of Jaguar, Audi. Benz does not even bring their EV to US.
If you are buying a new EV just buy a Tesla, they are a generation ahead in many things but also making their own seats, reducing the wiring in the car etc. neat innovations.
Tesla is a halo brand, but more than that they have optimized the many things in a car from first principles.
There are many vying to be Samsung of EVs but only time will tell. My Bet is still on the Japanese.. with solid state battery. I have been wrong a lot so.. lets just call it a hunch.
I know my examples are not shiny. I am not a Tesla fanboy, but I have watched Sandy Monroe interview Musk, and my examples show how deep and wide the innovation goes that seem trivial from outside.
Here in Norway where we have a decent used EV market the teslas depreciates at about the same rate as the others. This was not the case in the beginning but it was mainly because tesla kept increasing the price of the model S.
I have a tesla (Model X raven long range) and an ioniq (28 kWh) EV, they're both good for their uses but I am more worried about the depreciation on the tesla than the hyundai. That said it will take a lot for me to get another brand than tesla for the main vehicle. The ioniq is nice but it's still a "fossil" with electric drive train. The X is like a space ship!
Regarding the samsung of EVs, I think it will be Hyundai or Kia not Vw. They have sold a lot of e-golfs etc but the new ID.3 is so plagued by software and hardware errors that I would never get one. I think the Japanese are too slow out of the gate, maybe with the exception of nissan but even the latter has stagnated since they first introduced the leaf.
I'm pretty impressed with VW's pivot into EV production. They are getting a lot right with the modular drivetrain, circular battery supply chain, vertical integration (in fact a friend commented their Power Day presentation slides looked a lot like Tesla's Battery Day). They have a huge lead in Europe with brand recognition (most people have forgotten dieselgate already), and the proof is in the pudding is what I see on the roads: lots of ID.3's out there driving around.
My main concern as a VW shareholder would be what the gross margins are like on their EV programme. They've been quite close-lipped about that (I even read some earnings calls trying to find out); analysts don't seem really sure either. But building an EV these days isn't just about the drivetrain, it's also about the over-the-air updates and all the other technology that goes into them, and that stuff all together is hard to get right. (I think VW had quite some teething problems with their software).
VW is my current favourite besides Tesla though. They have the most concrete roadmap, they have EV's on the road now (beating Tesla on deliveries in some countries), they have the capital and the engineering expertise.
I do think Toyota's solid state battery might have some promise but there's so little information that it seems more aspirational to me than a concrete strategy. I'd love to see Toyota be one of the legacy manufacturers that successfully competes in the EV age though, as a company they've done a lot of pioneering work in manufacturing.
VW has Euro 7 and a lot of customers who only buy local. They don't need to compete on quality to do well, they just have to beat a certain price point once the next round of EU emissions kick in.
As someone who's owned a Volkswagen that was fun to drive but had some engineering flaws, I'm not looking to return to that experience with a Tesla. Even VW never had (as far as I know) a car that could rip its own bumper off if you managed to catch a puddle wrong. Tesla is an amazing halo brand but their cars are (IMHO) first and foremost about the driving experience including range. The regular paint flaws, seam alignment issues, bumper problem and rust issues make me think they still have some work to do for fit and finish. Don't get me wrong: they're probably the best out there for now, but they could improve. And eventually competitors may be able to offer a compelling mix of performance and range along with build quality that drains Tesla customers who were compromising. VW doesn't have to match Tesla point for point, they just have to make something good enough people will buy it instead.
I would hope Volkswagen would aspire to be something greater than Samsung. Does this mean after 2 years they stop pushing updates to the car and no longer support it?
Tesla spent 20 billion to get where it is. By the time the other manufacturers spend 20 billion to catch up , Tesla will have spent another 20 billion.
An article from Wolf Street
Why the EV Battle Is Brutal for GM, Ford, Other Automakers
Samsung recently announced that it would offer four years of software support to most of its Galaxy smartphones and tablets. That's two or three major Android OS updates and security patches for an additional year. More than Pixels I think. That combined with very nice hardware makes Samsung a great choice for Android phones - they are the only ones remaining that make Android tablets as well.
Volkswagen is a large conglomerate, they own both "economy" brands like VW itself (which is already simplified since the VW brand also sells low-end luxury cars like the Phaeton) but also premium brands like Porsche (well actually they don't own them, it's complicated), Bugatti, Bentley and Lamborghini. If they leverage their technology platform correctly they could outcompete Tesla in many areas, though it remains to be seen if they are actually able to.
Also Audi. The typeface that's part of the Volkswagen branding is called VAG rounded where VAG stands for Volkswagen Audi Group. Yes, I learn about corporate structures through typography.
See, their plans are already far ahead of the competition.
But Tesla's battery plans are detailed and specific, 50% reduction in cost with the same battery chemistry by doing these 5 things. VW's is 50% reduction in cost by changing to Iron. Tesla's already using Iron in their standard range cars, there's just no comparison
I have been eyeing an EV as my next car. The company that I think is best positioned is actually Hyundai/Kia. And like Samsung, again it’s a Korean company.
If you look at the Ioniq 5, this is exactly the type of design that I’d expect to see from Apple, more so than a Tesla. This may explain the discussion of a Hyundai apple partnership. Tesla has the worst parts of the Apple experience but they don’t yet have the quality and cohesion that makes people make that sacrifice and go all in on Apple.
The ioniq 5 has displays for side mirrors, unabashedly modern headlamps, front and rear sliding seats and console, vehicle to grid able to power large appliances, augmented reality heads up display, automatic lane change, parking, and other self driving features, an instrument cluster display (headphone jack?), and best in class rapid charging. Hyundai rethought the car in the context of EVs and has done some useful things like extending the wheelbase to grow the size of the cabin.
When you compare it to the egg like Tesla Model Y, I think the Hyundai shows a more cohesive design, offers more useful features and will be a better car overall. They also have real dealerships and the possibility of maintenance, and provide a warranty better than all other manufacturers.
Tesla definitely has a much stronger brand than Hyundai, but that will change as more people see cars like the Ioniq 5 on the road.
Tesla went cheap with the 3/Y to hit time-to-market window. Singular screen/etc are cost/design savings as much as style I think. I debated a Y as a family car but look elsewhere as it was just a fugly Chonk.
> type of design that I’d expect to see from Apple, more so than a Tesla
I think the opposite here honestly. Apple tends to do more simple initial rollout; saying features are bad/worthless/dumb until they have them in the second or third gen where they claim better implementation.
The biggest Tesla/Apple comparison to me is the network - Tesla SuperChargers are the walled-garden lockin. I bought an EV recently; and the ubiquity of SC's on my primary travel corridor pushed me to Tesla. I know there are lots of other charger networks out there; but Tesla's can use them; but the Ioniq likely won't be able to charge on the SC network for a fair while yet.
>Tesla definitely has a much stronger brand than Hyundai, but that will change as more people see cars like the Ioniq 5 on the road.
Why? It looks like yet another Volkswagen Golf on the outside. If it was actually something exciting like the Honda e, I might get it, but it looks like a very average hatchback.
It’s actually a CUV, the number one selling type of car in the US, and is much larger than a Golf. The ride height is lower and The wheelbase is stretched which makes it look smaller than it is. They also have the kia ev6 which is a more organic type of design on the same platform.
I actually drive a GTI now so I like the blocky golf styling and the retro/cyberpunk look of the Ioniq5. The car is intended to pay homage to the old Hyundai pony coupe concept.
Building a 2T machine to transport 95% of the time 80kg of human is the problem.
Having fuel, lithium, hydrogen or something else will not solve the big problem: we need to put more people in cars and reduce the amount of cars that we need.
The real EV revolution is e-bikes and other forms of micromobility. Already more e-bikes were sold in Germany last year than electric cars were sold in all of Europe.[0] In the Netherlands e-bikes outsold all cars last year, not just EVs.[1]
Wouldn't this require Volkswagen to be the primary provider of battery tech? Isn't this what Telsa's already is doing, so wouldn't that mean Tesla is more like Apple+Samsung?
So in the ~50 posts written so far, the biggest word I don't see yet wrt Tesla is "supercharge", as-in their supercharging network. It remains an enormous Achilles' heel for competitors that really kind of puts a hard stop on a lot of other debate in my opinion. So far in the US at least it's still the case that everyone sort of seems to be assuming that eventually widespread generic charging networks will, like, just kind of happen on their own. And that probably will be true. Eventually. And I know there have been some haphazard plans to address it. But the fact on the ground remains that every other network seems to really suck in comparison to the infrastructure investment and quality-of-experience Tesla has made. Superchargers are starting to reach the point where they're reliably available nearly any time they're needed (ie., on trips beyond normal nightly charging). The experience of using them is convenient and pleasant. They're clean. They're not broken regularly. They work.
Yeah Telsa's quality control issues are real. I agree that cars like the Ioniq 5 look very interesting in terms of interior design and QoL features that I care way, way more about than some theoretical top speed or acceleration or whatever that I'll never remotely touch in my life. But then inevitably when considering full ICE replacement (and cars in the $30k+ price class for most of us are going to be main vehicles not just-for-going-around-town) it comes back around to the whole actually-getting-electricity-into-the-vehicle-on-long-trips bit and woof.
A few months back HN had a long thread on an HBR piece "Tesla’s charging stations left other manufacturers in the dust" [0], and it says it all. If other manufacturers can't get that sorted out it'll continue to be a major drag on their ambitions and give Tesla more runway to sort out their growing pains. Tesla is ultimately an electric infrastructure company along with cars, and I think that does matter at this stage of electrification.
That seems backwards to me, this next generation coming out absolutely does fit the around town car. I am not sure what percentage of the population fits "couple, one commutes to work, one is at home, live around a metro" but having a EV for city driving, and a ICE for road trips would be a completely normal configuration for many families in America, and kicks the charger network question down the road for at least half a decade. If it can replace ONE ICE vehicle, and you still own another, range becomes a non-issue. Now its a question of cost, can they deliver the experience at $20k. A $20K car that is delivered now, and a charging network that comes later may not hinder people from dipping their feet into their first EV. Charge time is the part of the car that cant be upgraded later, network can.
Tesla has what, 1000 charging stations across America, and Electrify America has 500?
> Tesla has what, 1000 charging stations across America, and Electrify America has 500?
Considering all CCS networks, including Electrify America, there are currently 4,238 CCS charging sites in the US and Canada. Set the charger type to "DC Fast" and the connector to CCS to see an overview:
I was just looking into this yesterday, and one downside is there seems to be a lot of DC “Fast” chargers that have a limit of 24KWh. Better than level 2, but that basically means sitting around for well over an hour for even a 50% charge. Not a fan of Tesla so hoping the CCS charging network continues to expand and actually be fast.
Its amazing to me how people always want to analyze everything in terms of the Smartphone market.
This is nonsense. It simply doesn't make sense. They are completely different industries, completely different players and very different geopolitics.
One is a tiny consumer product for your pocket that gets replaced every 2-3 years that is easy to transport, the other is a huge consumer product people often keep for 5-10 years that is hard to transport.
Sure, both have Li-Ion battery but again its totally different. In a phone the battery is a small part of the overall price, while for a car its a huge factor in the overall price.
Tesla is not like Apple, in many ways and Volkswagen is not like Samsung in many ways. Tesla is like Apple in some ways but not in others. The same for VW.
The car market simply does not operate like the cellphone market, the role of software is different. The geopolitics are different, every 'Western' government that has a car industry is bent on defending it. Even outside of that, producing cars is such a massive capital intensive business that hits your cash-flow localization of production is basically a requirement for the biggest players.
Tesla is amazingly successful and have a strategy of strong vertical integration. They have a tech future centered image promising fun, good performance and environmentally friendly. They are building up localized production of a few models that they want to sell in very high numbers globally. They are hell bent on increasing battery production and on solving self driving.
Tesla will continue to grow at a quite rapid rate year over year and no matter if other EV come into the market that will likely not destroy Tesla growth anytime soon. Tesla is one of the largest costumers of all of the major battery companies and is turning itself into one of the largest battery producers as well. That alone is a huge advantage as with the continuing cost curves, it is likely almost all EV that can be produced, will be produced and will be sold.
They have also smartly invested in charging network and are an omnipresent symbol of EV along all major routes in the developed world and they are expanding that network every day.
VW is the first really big monster company that has fully realized not just that it needs to be done, but also that all the talk about how the car industry talk about how easy EV were and if they wanted Tesla would be crushed is not the case. Going into EV on large scale is breathtakingly difficult and VW has mobilized the whole company, made huge investment both in suppliers both now and future suppliers, they have transform their internal plans (of all their companies) and are trying to execute. They are doing quite a good job along most levels.
VW and Tesla will both be large parts of the EV future, whatever will happen in terms of mobility service, self-driving and so on.
There are open question for VW about how to transition such a large company but Tesla also have open question about continuing to execute a massive growth strategy. Both companies are set up for success if they continue to execute at a high level.
77 comments
[ 3.6 ms ] story [ 156 ms ] threadDo you also not fly Boeing because they are directly related to killing countless of civilians across the planet, including two nuclear weapons drops on populated cities by their B-29s?
Apple's always owned the entirety of the profit in the entire global smartphone space.
[1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnkoetsier/2019/12/22/global-...
https://electrek.co/2020/10/30/tesla-tsla-market-share-globa...
[1] https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/tesla-cars-ev-registratio...
By any reasonable non-pedantic measure, Tesla has actually been quite profitable over the last couple of years. They've put their entire profit towards building additional production capacity. Of course, they've also used the current investment climate to make capital raises that are bigger than their profits.
IIRC, Tesla have reported profit and cashflow minus capital spending for the last few years, and these numbers show what you expect: A business that's very profitable from a per-unit perspective.
The market cap is a different question, but let's treat that as a separate question.
Fit and finish was impeccable and certainly better than Tesla's, but they were constantly breaking in ridiculous ways. My advice, never ever own one outside of warranty unless it's >20 years old and you can wrench on it yourself.
YMMV of course.
Edit: Sunroof leaked, water collected at lowest point inside car where Toyota had decided to locate electrical connectors that fed the instruments.
2 x coil packs, Tie end rods, Vacuum pipe to the intake manifold, A/C heat exchanger.
This was all before 60,000 km.
I would be more interested to see who eventually becomes the Apple of the EV works.
I do think Nissan's know-how will play a role but much more likely that the actual sales numbers will come from the Alliance's more agressive cost-cutting brands like Renault or even Dacia.
Volkswagen is about to launch many electric modele across many brands, using a single modular platform.
I feel the difficulty of making EVs has been vastly exaggerated - any manufacturer that knows how to make an hybrid knows how to make an EV.
they do. they however do not seem to understand how to build up a good charging infastructure.
Previously it was "we want to take $X from the customer who buys the car, what can we cram into the package so that they feel they got something appropriate in return?", whereas for EV it's more liked "the battery is $X, $X+$tiny is the highest we could possibly demand, we need to find the least embarrassing car we can build around that battery for $tiny". Tesla's innovation was starting EV at the luxury end of the market, all previous attempts were doing the opposite. Compared to that all other Tesla innovations are insignificant, no matter how big they are on their own.
Sure, that's no dedicated EV platform. But who really cares for cars one size class smaller than a Golf, or the same?
And I know it’s still fashionable to bash Tesla on HN (Tesla is one of the few companies still pursuing customer-owned self-driving capability even after the overall hype curve has peaked and they haven’t yet reached their goal, so they get lots of grief for that, some of which is understandable), but their electric car offerings are head and shoulders above anyone else still. I’m looking forward to more competition that actually meets Tesla’s level of performance, maybe Rivian (when will they deliver?) or Lucid. The other pure electric cars on the market especially in the US are like toys in comparison (although still can be good value and better than conventional cars).
VW I hope will have a good showing, though. Still no one is really pursuing a good charging network solution that is seamless & practical like Tesla’s.
Just doing basically 1 car not updating it much and then not doing anything for many years while losing many billions at same time, is literally the exact opposite of being in a great position.
The Ariya is their first car after a long time and based on all the reviews I have seen it has not blown anybodies mind.
Overall Nissan volume are small and they are nowhere near as deep in terms of battery supply chain as Tesla or VW.
If you are buying a new EV just buy a Tesla, they are a generation ahead in many things but also making their own seats, reducing the wiring in the car etc. neat innovations.
Tesla is a halo brand, but more than that they have optimized the many things in a car from first principles.
There are many vying to be Samsung of EVs but only time will tell. My Bet is still on the Japanese.. with solid state battery. I have been wrong a lot so.. lets just call it a hunch.
I'd chose battery tech, self-driving stack, operating system, design and manufacturing expertise i.e. full body vehicle stamping
Bearing in mind that the Tesla is a Beta too, I'd say its far from certain which stack is crap
But I'll happily review more evidence in a year or two :)
I have a tesla (Model X raven long range) and an ioniq (28 kWh) EV, they're both good for their uses but I am more worried about the depreciation on the tesla than the hyundai. That said it will take a lot for me to get another brand than tesla for the main vehicle. The ioniq is nice but it's still a "fossil" with electric drive train. The X is like a space ship!
Regarding the samsung of EVs, I think it will be Hyundai or Kia not Vw. They have sold a lot of e-golfs etc but the new ID.3 is so plagued by software and hardware errors that I would never get one. I think the Japanese are too slow out of the gate, maybe with the exception of nissan but even the latter has stagnated since they first introduced the leaf.
My main concern as a VW shareholder would be what the gross margins are like on their EV programme. They've been quite close-lipped about that (I even read some earnings calls trying to find out); analysts don't seem really sure either. But building an EV these days isn't just about the drivetrain, it's also about the over-the-air updates and all the other technology that goes into them, and that stuff all together is hard to get right. (I think VW had quite some teething problems with their software).
VW is my current favourite besides Tesla though. They have the most concrete roadmap, they have EV's on the road now (beating Tesla on deliveries in some countries), they have the capital and the engineering expertise.
I do think Toyota's solid state battery might have some promise but there's so little information that it seems more aspirational to me than a concrete strategy. I'd love to see Toyota be one of the legacy manufacturers that successfully competes in the EV age though, as a company they've done a lot of pioneering work in manufacturing.
Definitely interesting times!
a) be big
b) hint at having amazing technology that literally blows everybody away but never show it or put a timeline on it
c) bash EV in public as much as possible and lobby against them.
Tesla spent 20 billion to get where it is. By the time the other manufacturers spend 20 billion to catch up , Tesla will have spent another 20 billion.
An article from Wolf Street
Why the EV Battle Is Brutal for GM, Ford, Other Automakers
https://wolfstreet.com/2021/02/18/why-the-ev-battle-is-bruta...
VW has already invested about $10bn and will invest $86bn over the next 5 years.
Wasn't Phaeton a massive flop?
But Tesla's battery plans are detailed and specific, 50% reduction in cost with the same battery chemistry by doing these 5 things. VW's is 50% reduction in cost by changing to Iron. Tesla's already using Iron in their standard range cars, there's just no comparison
If you look at the Ioniq 5, this is exactly the type of design that I’d expect to see from Apple, more so than a Tesla. This may explain the discussion of a Hyundai apple partnership. Tesla has the worst parts of the Apple experience but they don’t yet have the quality and cohesion that makes people make that sacrifice and go all in on Apple.
The ioniq 5 has displays for side mirrors, unabashedly modern headlamps, front and rear sliding seats and console, vehicle to grid able to power large appliances, augmented reality heads up display, automatic lane change, parking, and other self driving features, an instrument cluster display (headphone jack?), and best in class rapid charging. Hyundai rethought the car in the context of EVs and has done some useful things like extending the wheelbase to grow the size of the cabin.
When you compare it to the egg like Tesla Model Y, I think the Hyundai shows a more cohesive design, offers more useful features and will be a better car overall. They also have real dealerships and the possibility of maintenance, and provide a warranty better than all other manufacturers.
Tesla definitely has a much stronger brand than Hyundai, but that will change as more people see cars like the Ioniq 5 on the road.
> type of design that I’d expect to see from Apple, more so than a Tesla
I think the opposite here honestly. Apple tends to do more simple initial rollout; saying features are bad/worthless/dumb until they have them in the second or third gen where they claim better implementation.
The biggest Tesla/Apple comparison to me is the network - Tesla SuperChargers are the walled-garden lockin. I bought an EV recently; and the ubiquity of SC's on my primary travel corridor pushed me to Tesla. I know there are lots of other charger networks out there; but Tesla's can use them; but the Ioniq likely won't be able to charge on the SC network for a fair while yet.
Why? It looks like yet another Volkswagen Golf on the outside. If it was actually something exciting like the Honda e, I might get it, but it looks like a very average hatchback.
I actually drive a GTI now so I like the blocky golf styling and the retro/cyberpunk look of the Ioniq5. The car is intended to pay homage to the old Hyundai pony coupe concept.
Building a 2T machine to transport 95% of the time 80kg of human is the problem.
Having fuel, lithium, hydrogen or something else will not solve the big problem: we need to put more people in cars and reduce the amount of cars that we need.
[0]https://nitter.42l.fr/happy_roman/status/1369633949815803906
[1]https://nitter.42l.fr/oliverbruce/status/1370087719603298307
Volkswagen will use the same EV platform in Volkswagen, Audi, SEAT and Škoda brands. Porsche makes their own. Volkswagen
Tesla competes mostly with Volkswagen, Audi and Porche. Seat and Škoda will be cheaper models.
Yeah Telsa's quality control issues are real. I agree that cars like the Ioniq 5 look very interesting in terms of interior design and QoL features that I care way, way more about than some theoretical top speed or acceleration or whatever that I'll never remotely touch in my life. But then inevitably when considering full ICE replacement (and cars in the $30k+ price class for most of us are going to be main vehicles not just-for-going-around-town) it comes back around to the whole actually-getting-electricity-into-the-vehicle-on-long-trips bit and woof.
A few months back HN had a long thread on an HBR piece "Tesla’s charging stations left other manufacturers in the dust" [0], and it says it all. If other manufacturers can't get that sorted out it'll continue to be a major drag on their ambitions and give Tesla more runway to sort out their growing pains. Tesla is ultimately an electric infrastructure company along with cars, and I think that does matter at this stage of electrification.
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0: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25930253
Tesla has what, 1000 charging stations across America, and Electrify America has 500?
Considering all CCS networks, including Electrify America, there are currently 4,238 CCS charging sites in the US and Canada. Set the charger type to "DC Fast" and the connector to CCS to see an overview:
https://afdc.energy.gov/fuels/electricity_locations.html#/fi...
This is nonsense. It simply doesn't make sense. They are completely different industries, completely different players and very different geopolitics.
One is a tiny consumer product for your pocket that gets replaced every 2-3 years that is easy to transport, the other is a huge consumer product people often keep for 5-10 years that is hard to transport.
Sure, both have Li-Ion battery but again its totally different. In a phone the battery is a small part of the overall price, while for a car its a huge factor in the overall price.
Tesla is not like Apple, in many ways and Volkswagen is not like Samsung in many ways. Tesla is like Apple in some ways but not in others. The same for VW.
The car market simply does not operate like the cellphone market, the role of software is different. The geopolitics are different, every 'Western' government that has a car industry is bent on defending it. Even outside of that, producing cars is such a massive capital intensive business that hits your cash-flow localization of production is basically a requirement for the biggest players.
Tesla is amazingly successful and have a strategy of strong vertical integration. They have a tech future centered image promising fun, good performance and environmentally friendly. They are building up localized production of a few models that they want to sell in very high numbers globally. They are hell bent on increasing battery production and on solving self driving.
Tesla will continue to grow at a quite rapid rate year over year and no matter if other EV come into the market that will likely not destroy Tesla growth anytime soon. Tesla is one of the largest costumers of all of the major battery companies and is turning itself into one of the largest battery producers as well. That alone is a huge advantage as with the continuing cost curves, it is likely almost all EV that can be produced, will be produced and will be sold.
They have also smartly invested in charging network and are an omnipresent symbol of EV along all major routes in the developed world and they are expanding that network every day.
VW is the first really big monster company that has fully realized not just that it needs to be done, but also that all the talk about how the car industry talk about how easy EV were and if they wanted Tesla would be crushed is not the case. Going into EV on large scale is breathtakingly difficult and VW has mobilized the whole company, made huge investment both in suppliers both now and future suppliers, they have transform their internal plans (of all their companies) and are trying to execute. They are doing quite a good job along most levels.
VW and Tesla will both be large parts of the EV future, whatever will happen in terms of mobility service, self-driving and so on.
There are open question for VW about how to transition such a large company but Tesla also have open question about continuing to execute a massive growth strategy. Both companies are set up for success if they continue to execute at a high level.