Welcome to Tesla Motors Club
Discuss Tesla's Model S, Model 3, Model X, Model Y, Cybertruck, Roadster and More.
Register

Increased Car Prices and $12k FSD...Just Insanity!

This site may earn commission on affiliate links.
I doubt you can get away with using your personal prejudices … your company would fire you ;)

ps : I would be very interested in seeing what % they have recognized and what the justification is. Quite a difficult problem since you don’t know what % of work has been done / finished.

I think its more like being able to call a penalty on Tom Brady.

It's not that I'd allow personal prejudices to corrupt my judgement, but there would be that satisfaction when it was the right call.
 
  • Funny
Reactions: EVNow
They’re recognizing a fair chunk of that money as revenue since they claim BS features like stop light and “smart” summon detection count as FSD.

Those are literally specifically listed features of FSD. Spelled out to the buyer during the purchase process.

So your argument is "They cheat by doing exactly what they said in writing they would do"

That is... not a great argument.

Might be time to consider you're wrong.
 
Even older customers who had the promise of autonomous driving in writing on the order page have to accept that the promise no longer stands. It no longer stands because it seems extremely likely that Tesla will force customers to give up L2 on city streets in exchange for a refund of not anymore than $3K.

This is just an outright lie.

We've already debunked all your previous arguments on the pre/post 3/19 split and now you're restoring to this?

That's not how contracts work.

You don't get to change a previous contract with one person because you now offer a DIFFERENT contract to new customers.[/QUOTE]
 
This is just an outright lie.

We've already debunked all your previous arguments on the pre/post 3/19 split and now you're restoring to this?

That's not how contracts work.

You don't get to change a previous contract with one person because you now offer a DIFFERENT contract to new customers.

I'm not saying they're swapping contracts without consent.

What I'm saying is Tesla will give pre 3/2019 buyers the option of taking a refund due to the failure to achieve autonomous driving. So they'll get the money they paid for it back, but they won't get any additional compensation for it.

For example years ago I gave up free supercharging for a check for $5K from Tesla. This was part of the "Fred is Mad, Lets make Fred Happy" fiasco years ago. I agreed to terminate Tesla free supercharging for life in exchange for money.

I expect to see the same thing for FSD within a couple years where Tesla will give me options to select from where the purpose is for them to get out of the autonomous driving promise to me.

I don't expect to get cash, and the ability to keep L2 FSD.

People will go for the options Tesla gives them because what recourse do they really have? Most people don't want to get involved in a lawsuit as the lawyers are the only ones that get anything.
 
Last edited:
One more interesting data point. This is about Toyota's highway "auto pilot" feature in Mirai ... The feature will cost you a whopping $21,000 since you have to buy the higher trim.

The feature itself is only $5,170 but the catch is you can't buy it with the cheaper $49,500 XLE, you have to buy the more expensive version "Limited" starting with $66,000. So the total price would be $71,170.

Not many people buy Mirai so we might not learn how well this consumer LIDAR works in preventing collisions.
 
Well, all I know it that I was set to trade in my 2018 LR Model 3 with FSD for a new Model Y (without a tax credit), but then Tesla raised their car prices and drastically increased the price of FSD. Now Tesla is not getting my money for a new car and I will be keeping my Model 3 a bit longer. Yes, I'm missing out on longer range and newer technology but finances are tough right now and all their price increases pushed beyond my affordability limit. Sucks for me and for them. EV's were supposed to be getting less expensive as the technology becomes more mainstream but they seem to be getting more expensive and more people than ever can't afford them.
 
Well, all I know it that I was set to trade in my 2018 LR Model 3 with FSD for a new Model Y (without a tax credit), but then Tesla raised their car prices and drastically increased the price of FSD. Now Tesla is not getting my money for a new car and I will be keeping my Model 3 a bit longer. Yes, I'm missing out on longer range and newer technology but finances are tough right now and all their price increases pushed beyond my affordability limit. Sucks for me and for them. EV's were supposed to be getting less expensive as the technology becomes more mainstream but they seem to be getting more expensive and more people than ever can't afford them.
If by mainstream you mean 1-3 percent sure. All materials and supplies are in crazy demand and prices. Don’t think it’s a Tesla thing.
 
You can subscribe to FSD for $200, right?
Yes, but you don't get the included hardware upgrades should FSD need them. We've gotten one hardware upgrade so far. I'm really hoping they include the side repeater cameras for FSD, so the night blinker washed out video is no longer an issue. The new repeaters don't have the light bleed issue due to internal hardware changes.
 
If by mainstream you mean 1-3 percent sure. All materials and supplies are in crazy demand and prices. Don’t think it’s a Tesla thing.
Yes, but did that justify 12 price increases last year? And I doubt the cost savings of the 4680 batteries will be passed on to consumers. Look, I get it that Tesla is a company that deserves to make a profit. But, lets now forget why Elon pushed so hard to get this company to succeed. It was to reduce the planet's carbon footprint and give the masses an affordable EV option, yet Tesla's are anything but affordable for the average person. And Elon's $35k Model 3 only lasted a few weeks before they yanked it. I enjoy my Model 3, wish I could afford a Model S. This was the most expensive vehicle I have ever purchased with the worst service center issues. But, it is the safest vehicle on the road, the most fun to drive, and the most convenient way to fill the tank (while I'm sleeping at home). I used the love the OTA software updates, not so much anymore after this new UI came out. I am glad they finally give us an option for the Premium Connectivity as an annual plan at a discounted rate. I do wish they'd let us transfer FSD to another vehicle. Obviously they need to make money from FSD, so they can't let everyone continuously transfer it to new vehicles over and over. So maybe allow it for a fee?
 
Last edited:
Sucks for me and for them. EV's were supposed to be getting less expensive as the technology becomes more mainstream but they seem to be getting more expensive and more people than ever can't afford them.
Sucks for us … not so sure about them … unless you mean by “sucks” a year long order book.

If they don’t increase prices people flipping the car as soon as they get them will increase, that’s all. I prefer Tesla gets more money than some unscrupulous trader in between.

 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Yelobird
I meant it sucks for them because they lost out on getting more of my money from the sale of a new car.

No they didn't.

There's a massively long line of people waiting for that car and happy to pay for it at current prices.

Lowering prices at this point would sell 0 more cars, because they don't have any more to sell. This despite increasing production >50% year over year every year the company has been mass producing.[/B] so And appears like it'll remain true for a considerable amount of time into the future too.
 
Last edited:
Given the FSD money taken for undelivered features can not be recognized by Tesla as revenue- in fact it instead sits as a liability on their books-- combined with the fact the total amount of it is a tiny fraction of the actual cash Tesla has just sitting around - what possible motivation can you believe exists for that to be his "goal"?
I know nobody here would have a definitive answer, but I wonder how Tesla's books weigh each of FSD's features. There are 6 listed features (besides the FSD hardware itself): Navigate on Autopilot, Auto Lane Change, Autopark, Summon, Traffic Light and Stop Sign Control, and Autosteer on City Streets. Of those, 5 have been delivered (most with beta tags with plenty of room for improvement). So, does that mean Tesla is only seeing 1/6 * $12000 = $2000 worth of liability per FSD license sold? Or would Autosteer on City Streets be weighted differently since it is much more work and resources are going into it?
 

Tesla's CFO Zach Kirkhorn, during the announcement of Q1 2020 results, said that the price of Tesla FSD is only about 50% recognizable as GAAP Revenue

Note this was prior to release of stop light/stop sign reaction.

In the Q2 2020 call Zach told us

Zach Kirkhorn said:
With the release of Stop Light and Stop Sign recognition and response, we recognized $48 million of deferred revenue in the period. The full profit impact on our P&L is less than half of this due to cost associated with FSD computer retrofits in the field.

That said, we don't know precisely what % of remaining revenue that 48 million was since the total listed for "deferred revenue" on the books includes more things than just FSD revenue.... plus it includes different amounts from different customers.... and also a significantly different allocation for pre/post 3/19 buyers (though that amount is likely small either way)
 
  • Informative
Reactions: EVNow
I know nobody here would have a definitive answer, but I wonder how Tesla's books weigh each of FSD's features. There are 6 listed features (besides the FSD hardware itself): Navigate on Autopilot, Auto Lane Change, Autopark, Summon, Traffic Light and Stop Sign Control, and Autosteer on City Streets. Of those, 5 have been delivered (most with beta tags with plenty of room for improvement). So, does that mean Tesla is only seeing 1/6 * $12000 = $2000 worth of liability per FSD license sold? Or would Autosteer on City Streets be weighted differently since it is much more work and resources are going into it?

I don't see anything on Tesla's website that shows what Autosteer on City Streets is even supposed to do. So I'm not sure what the deliverable even has to look like.

All 5 of the ones you listed have restrictions on usage that wasn't communicated by Tesla before they were released, but I don't think those limitations stopped Tesla from recognizing revenue.

Autosteer on city streets might just be the opposite if FSD Beta is to be judged. FSD Beta goes far beyond what a minimal implementation of what autosteer on city streets could be.

The hardest thing for autotomy is to make a decision.

NoA doesn't really make decisions in any kind of intelligent manner. Even its upcoming competitors don't seem to have put any work into planning lane changes in any kind of traffic aware manner.

Traffic Light Stop sign response doesn't make a decision either. It always stops if its a red light or a stop sign. It only goes on green if there is a car in front of you proceeding through the light.

Smart Summon is frustrating because it's just so idiotic. I feel bad for it as it doesn't have 360 degree downfacing cameras which even for a human the lack of is annoying.

FSD Beta single stack might go a long way to fixing NoA, and makes the entire Traffic Light & Stop Sign control rather pointless to have as a bullet point.

There are also things like reverse summon that are in the works, but not listed.

Hopefully Tesla will be able to collect 100% of the revenue for the post 3/2019 definition of FSD so they can update the bullet points to what's coming beyond autosteer on city streets.

Where we no longer play the accounting game.