TrendTrader007
Active Member
I think so too. I can't imagine regulators getting ahead of TSLA
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dennis
Model S Plaid
I'm not so positive about SP impact. Tesla's AutoPilot is the only one that has been linked to fatalities (FL and China). Even if there isn't an immediate "recall", the bears will dissect the 15 points and hammer Tesla with anything that remotely relates to these fatalities.
Interesting to say the least! I'm wondering if the prices will be a bit whipsaw tomorrow and the day after. Trying to figure out a good price point to buy on the potential neg SP impact of the regulations (since I doubt most traders know that 8.0 coming out Wed). I do not believe this will have a lasting impact on SP given Tesla's ability to issue "recall fixes" with OTA updates. I keep thinking about Andrea James' interview where she talks about east coast/west coast perceptions, and how most traders/investors in NY don't drive...
From Electrek..
GM again reaffirmed that the Bolt EV will be delivered in “late 2016”, but it also again used the words “available at select dealerships”. These “select dealerships” will likely be in ZEV states. It looks like GM still has to prove that the Bolt EV is not a compliance car.
There you have it.. "Select stealerships". Code for compliance car. No competition to M3.
GM again reaffirmed that the Bolt EV will be delivered in “late 2016”, but it also again used the words “available at select dealerships”. These “select dealerships” will likely be in ZEV states. It looks like GM still has to prove that the Bolt EV is not a compliance car.
There you have it.. "Select stealerships". Code for compliance car. No competition to M3.
I wouldn't be so pessimistic. GM Volts are sold throughout the country, just not at all dealerships. Those dealerships went through specialized training to sell an electric car (The Volt is enough of an electric car to require specialized training and tools). Those same dealerships would presumably want to leverage their EV investment and sell Bolts.
dennis
Model S Plaid
A likely scenario is that Tesla has been talking with the Feds and the increased nagging in 8.0 is designed to comply with the coming Regs.
Can't help but to think these rules were pushed by the likes of GM, Ford, etc to hurt Tesla. All this over one fatality still under investigation which is now probably close to 200 million miles driven on AP?
Yeah, this was already brought up, chewed up, and spit out early in the morning. Much ado about nothing.
It's entirely possible that the Feds could announce plans to recall AP 7.1 but AP 8.0 will be deemed sufficient and start to roll out on Wednesday. It could be a quick dip and a fairly quick recovery for the SP. This might be a nice opportunity to buy at a bit of a discount before the market realizes that AP 8.0 is rolling out this week.
The biggest risk is that since AP 8.0 should make its debut with some of the autobraking features disabled until more data is collected about overhead signs, etc., the Feds could have an issue with Tesla's method for bringing 8.0 to fruition.
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Thanks for the comment about the autobraking features disabled (I didn't know). I would hope that when they roll it out, that one of the the first comments of the release note will be this.
dennis
Model S Plaid
The Feds did say that they are soliciting public comment for 60 days. I don't know if that means the regs will go into effect right away or after revisions based on the public comment period.
Also, it wasn't clear that Autobraking will be disabled in 8.0 or whether they would wait to transition to using the radar rather than the camera as the primary determinant of obstables until after they had accumulated sufficient whitelist data.
To be honest I'm baffled as to why some posters here view the Feds' new self-driving guidelines as a negative. After reading the NY times article (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/20/technology/self-driving-cars-guidelines.html) I'm feeling emboldened and optimistic as a Tesla investor. These guidelines are a major milestone and I think impact to TSLA short-term price should be neutral or slightly positive. It would be really dumb if there was any selling based on this news.
The Feds just fired the starter pistol in the race to autonomous driving. The market as a whole will now begin paying much closer attention to this race and watch how the players are doing. There are indeed many players. Most of them fall into one of two camps:
Incumbent OEM's
These include manufacturing juggernauts like GM and Ford who are pumping out the kind of volume that Tesla aspires to. They are based in places like Detroit, not Silicon Valley. Software is simply not in their DNA and they mostly recognize that they cannot make a plausible play at this market by developing autonomous tech in-house. Their only chance is to partner with or acquire true tech companies like Uber, Lyft, Google, Mobileye, Cruise or Comma.ai.
I just don't see that working out for the OEMs.
Once the major value add is in the tech, there is no fundamental reason--in the long-term--why their role is not totally commoditized. They will effectively be competing with one another to be the automotive Foxconn, building hardware to spec for the true owners of the ecosystem. They underestimate how ruthless tech companies are at devouring the markets they come into contact with. Just look at Mobileye, for example. They saw the stakes and tried to pull some crap with Tesla to lay claim to their data. They didn't get away with it, of course, but we'll get to that in a bit... And just look at how licensing Google's tech worked out for Yahoo. Silicon Valley is many things, but they are not suckers. There is absolutely no way they cede this market to OEMs and they definitely have the upper hand.
OEMs can try to acquire talent--GM with Cruise, for instance--but that's a real shot in the dark. The only acquisition targets so far have been tiny, young startups who have not brought anything plausible to market and seem to have taken the easy exit as acquihires. There is an insane impedance mismatch between a small, scrappy SV startup and a company like GM. There's no way they'll be empowered to truly drive the product or innovate at the top level. And companies like Google and Uber are obviously not plausible acquisition targets.
which brings us to...
True Tech Companies
These companies are obviously taking the opportunity very seriously as well but they will have a major challenge deploying instrumented vehicles at scale. To date, Google has a few dozen bespoke cars deployed mainly in a small portion of Northern California. Each one requires a trained employee behind the wheel. Uber has a few bespoke cars deployed in Pittsburgh. Each one requires a trained employee behind the wheel. It's just not scalable. There's too much data that needs to be collected, there's too many real-world edge cases that need to be resolved and the AI will never be trained well without many thousands of vehicles blanketing the world and driving millions and millions of real-world miles for real end-users. The data is insanely valuable. Mobileye sabotaged their relationship with Tesla for a shot at it.
So...the tech companies can either partner with OEMs to get significant numbers of vehicles into consumers' hands, or they can try to manufacture at scale themselves. The first approach comes with major disadvantages. My hunch is that Apple was contemplating this approach (it worked so well with iPhones, after all). They saw unique challenges in automotive hence the readjustment of strategy and layoffs at Project Titan.
The second approach will take significant time and capital, and is not something software-first companies have usually succeeded at. Look at how Nest fared under Google, for example.
If only there was a company that truly had Silicon Valley tech and disruption in every strand of its DNA (maybe helmed by one of the most successful software entrepreneurs of all time), but was also taking manufacturing very seriously, investing billions in new factories and working through manufacturing teething issues over the past decade. Hmmm...does anybody know of such a company?
Tesla is so far ahead in this race it's not even funny. They have 100,000 wholly-controlled, instrumented cars blanketing the developed world and are adding another 2,000 every week. They are the only ones collecting millions of real-world miles, using the data to hone the software and deploying updates and knowledge over-the-air to the entire fleet.
These federal guidelines are a non-issue. Tesla is obviously in constant communication with all the regulators. And as the only manufacturer capable of over-the-air updates, they can send out a compliance patch at-will if necessary. That's a major friggin advantage. Seriously, is there any aspect of mobility that this company has not thought ahead 10 steps?
The only thing this news does for me is underscore how massive Tesla's advantage in autonomy is right now. Unless they screw up in a major way it is their race to lose. Game on!
The Feds just fired the starter pistol in the race to autonomous driving. The market as a whole will now begin paying much closer attention to this race and watch how the players are doing. There are indeed many players. Most of them fall into one of two camps:
Incumbent OEM's
These include manufacturing juggernauts like GM and Ford who are pumping out the kind of volume that Tesla aspires to. They are based in places like Detroit, not Silicon Valley. Software is simply not in their DNA and they mostly recognize that they cannot make a plausible play at this market by developing autonomous tech in-house. Their only chance is to partner with or acquire true tech companies like Uber, Lyft, Google, Mobileye, Cruise or Comma.ai.
I just don't see that working out for the OEMs.
Once the major value add is in the tech, there is no fundamental reason--in the long-term--why their role is not totally commoditized. They will effectively be competing with one another to be the automotive Foxconn, building hardware to spec for the true owners of the ecosystem. They underestimate how ruthless tech companies are at devouring the markets they come into contact with. Just look at Mobileye, for example. They saw the stakes and tried to pull some crap with Tesla to lay claim to their data. They didn't get away with it, of course, but we'll get to that in a bit... And just look at how licensing Google's tech worked out for Yahoo. Silicon Valley is many things, but they are not suckers. There is absolutely no way they cede this market to OEMs and they definitely have the upper hand.
OEMs can try to acquire talent--GM with Cruise, for instance--but that's a real shot in the dark. The only acquisition targets so far have been tiny, young startups who have not brought anything plausible to market and seem to have taken the easy exit as acquihires. There is an insane impedance mismatch between a small, scrappy SV startup and a company like GM. There's no way they'll be empowered to truly drive the product or innovate at the top level. And companies like Google and Uber are obviously not plausible acquisition targets.
which brings us to...
True Tech Companies
These companies are obviously taking the opportunity very seriously as well but they will have a major challenge deploying instrumented vehicles at scale. To date, Google has a few dozen bespoke cars deployed mainly in a small portion of Northern California. Each one requires a trained employee behind the wheel. Uber has a few bespoke cars deployed in Pittsburgh. Each one requires a trained employee behind the wheel. It's just not scalable. There's too much data that needs to be collected, there's too many real-world edge cases that need to be resolved and the AI will never be trained well without many thousands of vehicles blanketing the world and driving millions and millions of real-world miles for real end-users. The data is insanely valuable. Mobileye sabotaged their relationship with Tesla for a shot at it.
So...the tech companies can either partner with OEMs to get significant numbers of vehicles into consumers' hands, or they can try to manufacture at scale themselves. The first approach comes with major disadvantages. My hunch is that Apple was contemplating this approach (it worked so well with iPhones, after all). They saw unique challenges in automotive hence the readjustment of strategy and layoffs at Project Titan.
The second approach will take significant time and capital, and is not something software-first companies have usually succeeded at. Look at how Nest fared under Google, for example.
If only there was a company that truly had Silicon Valley tech and disruption in every strand of its DNA (maybe helmed by one of the most successful software entrepreneurs of all time), but was also taking manufacturing very seriously, investing billions in new factories and working through manufacturing teething issues over the past decade. Hmmm...does anybody know of such a company?
Tesla is so far ahead in this race it's not even funny. They have 100,000 wholly-controlled, instrumented cars blanketing the developed world and are adding another 2,000 every week. They are the only ones collecting millions of real-world miles, using the data to hone the software and deploying updates and knowledge over-the-air to the entire fleet.
These federal guidelines are a non-issue. Tesla is obviously in constant communication with all the regulators. And as the only manufacturer capable of over-the-air updates, they can send out a compliance patch at-will if necessary. That's a major friggin advantage. Seriously, is there any aspect of mobility that this company has not thought ahead 10 steps?
The only thing this news does for me is underscore how massive Tesla's advantage in autonomy is right now. Unless they screw up in a major way it is their race to lose. Game on!
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I agree. I believe that ultimately the regulations will be of benefit to Tesla (since they have scale, real data and a committed work force). The issue is Wall Street. Any new regulation of a product/company by the gov't is usually seen as a negative. Add in the fact they are less likely to be up and up on the car stuff (as Andrea James pointed out, most don't drive and they already have "autopilot": Uber/Taxi or the MTA/Port Authority, depends on which office/floor you sit in). So, I am guessing that the news feed will degenerate from "Fed to announce autonomy guidelines" to "Feds regulates Tesla Autopilot" to "Feds blocking Tesla Autopilot," helped along by the shorts and clickbaits. Since most of the traders likely don't read more than the title, I'm guessing the SP may take a temporary hit, and a possible buy opportunity. In the long run, the regulations will be a good thing. But we all know of the market's myopia. Just my thoughts, we shall see...
Dennis- Yes, we don't know exactly how 8.0 will be implemented. The hardware in AP 1.0 may not be able to simultaneously compute both the combo camera/radar solution and the radar-only solution for obstacle avoidance. Since we were told that two different versions of autopilot could run simultaneously, I am somewhat optimistic the hardware is sufficiently robust. Standing by for an answer.
dha- Nice post and I hope you're right. What concerns me is politics. Consumer Reports has struck up the band and gone after Tesla's autopilot. Hopefully, the feds will be reasonable, but sometimes they're not. Again, we'll see.
dha- Nice post and I hope you're right. What concerns me is politics. Consumer Reports has struck up the band and gone after Tesla's autopilot. Hopefully, the feds will be reasonable, but sometimes they're not. Again, we'll see.
I'm waiting for the draft regs first. Never know how / to what ends GM and Ford pushed their lobbyists on influencing these regs. They very well may try to undermine them if they aren't ready. I know GM is working on SuperCruise but what does Ford have?
The new guidelines for self driving cars is slightly concerning to me.
Back in April, articles about auto manufacturer trade groups seeking to slow self driving car deployment popped up, such as:
Car makers ask US to slow down on allowing self-driving cars
This article says that NHSTA was going to issue guidance within 6 months -- that 6 months is right around now, so it looks like they were on point.
The trade group (which represents Aston Martin, Ferrari, Honda, Hyundai, Isuzu, Kia, Maserati, McLaren, Nissan, Subaru, and Suzuki, and Toyota.) was concerned a lack of regulation would allow unsafe cars on the road. This is pretty amazing that the car industry is asking for regulation -- usually they fight it tooth and nail. To me, it looks like the car companies on that list are the ones with the most basic driver assistance features, so it would make sense they'd want to slow the competitors with regulation, under the name of safety.
Back in April, articles about auto manufacturer trade groups seeking to slow self driving car deployment popped up, such as:
Car makers ask US to slow down on allowing self-driving cars
This article says that NHSTA was going to issue guidance within 6 months -- that 6 months is right around now, so it looks like they were on point.
The trade group (which represents Aston Martin, Ferrari, Honda, Hyundai, Isuzu, Kia, Maserati, McLaren, Nissan, Subaru, and Suzuki, and Toyota.) was concerned a lack of regulation would allow unsafe cars on the road. This is pretty amazing that the car industry is asking for regulation -- usually they fight it tooth and nail. To me, it looks like the car companies on that list are the ones with the most basic driver assistance features, so it would make sense they'd want to slow the competitors with regulation, under the name of safety.
But if you read the article you linked closely, it appears the trade group was not successful in their lobbying. The Feds said they would release guidance within 6 months and solicited feedback in an open hearing:
And now, six months later, we indeed only have "guidelines" as opposed to the more stringent "regulations" that the incumbents were apparently lobbying for:
From NY Times:
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That's why it was slightly concerning to me. It appears we are getting guidelines, vs regulations, which is probably good. Hopefully the influence of the trade group seeking to slow the progress isn't reflected in the guidelines. Sometimes, even when it doesn't go exactly the way the trade group wants, policy still includes remnants or parts of their input. We'll have to wait to see what the facts are, but there is certainly industry interest around this issue that will be important to be aware of.
DHA, The New York Times article has a totally different flavor than the USA Today piece. Thanks so much for posting. The emphasis of the New York Times article is that the feds are ready to give the thumbs up to autonomous driving efforts and have listed 15 guidelines, not regulations, to guide the development. Your comments about guidelines vs. regulations and opposing stringent regulations the incumbents wanted were particularly welcome.
In contrast, the USA Today piece put a lot of emphasis on concerns for driver assist technologies such as Tesla's and a statement that the NHTSA has the right to recall but hasn't stated if it had plans for a recall. I think there was a bit of Tesla FUDding in the USA Today piece.
After reading your comments and the New York Times article, I will be able to get some sleep tonight. Thanks.
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