It's tough to say, really. I honestly can't say any manufacturer has even entered the race until they speak to massive battery production and charging infrastructure. Putting out a compliance car means next to nothing to me. Putting out press releases and car show prototypes mean literally nothing to me. Show me an actionable plan to actually produce EVs at a massive scale. Start working toward that goal.
I still have yet to see a car company throw down the gauntlet and declare war on Tesla - to beat them at their own game, produce even more EVs, source more cheaper batteries than Tesla and create an even better charging network. Once I see that announcement and actual progress toward those goals, I'll consider there to be competition starting.
BYD?
Once there's an actual competition going, the questions turns to - 1. how far behind are these real competitors? and 2. how are they going to catch up?
2 is critical to me. Can you even imagine another car company being able to out-innovate Tesla and work harder than they do? They have a money advantage and little else. If they start 5 years behind (for the sake of argument), how do they accelerate faster than Tesla to close the gap? They need the engineering talent and have to work harder than Tesla. Then they have to be willing to accept MASSIVE risk, more than Elon is willing to bear. Good luck with that.
I think BYD has the right attitude to try to catch up, but they are clearly several years behind Tesla. Geely is taking a weird strategy but I think of them as a real competitor who might be able to catch up, but again, at least 3 years behind Tesla.
GM, honestly, is almost ready to start competing. Just needs a battery factory and a charging network. Maybe a couple more years... maybe not.
Audi swears they're going to start competing: I don't know whether to believe them or not, but *if they're telling the truth*, they're still 3 years behind.
Anyway, the way I look at it, *someone* will emerge as a major competitor. Since everyone is *at minimum* 2 years behind right now, however, Tesla has a large advantage.
And here's the important bit: even if there are *three* major competitors this still doesn't hurt Tesla for *years* because all of the competitors are taking market share from ICE cars, not from each other. Tesla can only expand production so fast: Tesla probably can't take more than 20% of the ICE market share until roughly 2025, so Tesla sales will be untouched by as many as three serious competitors until then. (Unless Tesla figures out how to expand faster, which would of course give Tesla a larger lead.)
