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New Holding Co - X
- Thread starter Paul_SF
- Start date
Tiger
Active Member
One could say the merger of Solar City into Tesla was a step in this possibility. Since I don’t follow the solar industry, I haven’t seen much description of how this has worked out. Thoughts?
Chicken genius offers a respectful counterpoint view in this 6 minute segment.
TL;DR first/pinned comment (by Tom Lee) makes the counter argument best.
@DaveT would love to see chicken genius on your channel again, to discuss the pros & cons.
TL;DR first/pinned comment (by Tom Lee) makes the counter argument best.
@DaveT would love to see chicken genius on your channel again, to discuss the pros & cons.
Last edited:
I had a great chat with Gali about some of the possible specifics for the X holding company.
Will be speaking with Chicken Genius soon as well.
RobStark
Well-Known Member
And the Rob Maurer’s 22 Dec discussion:
I do absolutely agree that the differing goals and priorities of different investors is a challenge for any such agglomeration into an umbrella company. Historically, both the examples he gave - GE, for instance - and many others that were such a dominant feature of 1960s - 1970s corporate America: the era of conglomerates, were not, advertising protestations notwithstanding*, for like-minded goals.
A small amount of historical lessons for some may be in order, but I’ll keep this absolutely brief. To me, the era was epitomized by International Telephone & Telegraph. The swooping rise and fall of ITT remains curious and fascinating to this day but here we have a domineering personality: Harold Geneen, and his attempts to grow an empire at the same time as trying to stay just on the compliance side of anti-trust regulations.
To that end, his one-time telecom company became the owner of....and here we go:
Sheraton Hotels
Wonder Bread
Rayonier (large forest products company)
Avis
The Hartford (insurance)
Canteen (vending machines)
Levitt & Sons (home builders)
and further, to encompass some 330 companies, some of which also were mini-conglomerates.
*Above asterisk: I remember one of these conglomerates’ ad campaign...it could have been ITT but I don’t think so...was “We’re synergistic!” A bunch of baloney, of course - in retrospect, what they were was a flailing corporation making use of early LBO activity.
So, two questions:
1. Does ITT still exist?
2. Do you see the binding chord running through those above-mentioned names?
Answers:
1. yes, but it is a minuscule shadow of its former self
2. If you do, you are unique in the world, as no one else ever was able to.
Now, a last observation specific to Rob’s video:
He includes in it a number of stock stills and videos. But WHERE, Rob, did you ever get that stock video of a screen and keyboard showing from the 10:35 - 10:53 time? That is a Cyrillic keyboard!
Rob is a plant. Uh oh.
I do absolutely agree that the differing goals and priorities of different investors is a challenge for any such agglomeration into an umbrella company. Historically, both the examples he gave - GE, for instance - and many others that were such a dominant feature of 1960s - 1970s corporate America: the era of conglomerates, were not, advertising protestations notwithstanding*, for like-minded goals.
A small amount of historical lessons for some may be in order, but I’ll keep this absolutely brief. To me, the era was epitomized by International Telephone & Telegraph. The swooping rise and fall of ITT remains curious and fascinating to this day but here we have a domineering personality: Harold Geneen, and his attempts to grow an empire at the same time as trying to stay just on the compliance side of anti-trust regulations.
To that end, his one-time telecom company became the owner of....and here we go:
Sheraton Hotels
Wonder Bread
Rayonier (large forest products company)
Avis
The Hartford (insurance)
Canteen (vending machines)
Levitt & Sons (home builders)
and further, to encompass some 330 companies, some of which also were mini-conglomerates.
*Above asterisk: I remember one of these conglomerates’ ad campaign...it could have been ITT but I don’t think so...was “We’re synergistic!” A bunch of baloney, of course - in retrospect, what they were was a flailing corporation making use of early LBO activity.
So, two questions:
1. Does ITT still exist?
2. Do you see the binding chord running through those above-mentioned names?
Answers:
1. yes, but it is a minuscule shadow of its former self
2. If you do, you are unique in the world, as no one else ever was able to.
Now, a last observation specific to Rob’s video:
He includes in it a number of stock stills and videos. But WHERE, Rob, did you ever get that stock video of a screen and keyboard showing from the 10:35 - 10:53 time? That is a Cyrillic keyboard!
Rob is a plant. Uh oh.
Buckminster
Well-Known Member
SemiS3XYR
Member
X’s mission is to ensure human survival and progress LOL
let’s dig monstrous tunnels and burn rocket fuel and use valuable resources so we can destroy another planet if we ever find one
We have billions of problems to solve on Earth. I understand sacrifices need to be made to make progress but what once started as a forefront for sustainability has turned into one man’s blindfolded mission for humanity.
zoom has had more impact on sustainability (no commuting to office)
let’s dig monstrous tunnels and burn rocket fuel and use valuable resources so we can destroy another planet if we ever find one
We have billions of problems to solve on Earth. I understand sacrifices need to be made to make progress but what once started as a forefront for sustainability has turned into one man’s blindfolded mission for humanity.
zoom has had more impact on sustainability (no commuting to office)
TheTalkingMule
Distributed Energy Enthusiast
It's going quite well. Tesla Energy can now focus on the mission of speeding our transition to a sustainable renewable energy system under the massive Tesla umbrella, whereas in the past SolarCity was out on an island fighting all the battles for the whole marketplace.
Brutally eliminating the 1-to-1 (usually door-to-door) sales process was the absolute correct move just after acquisition. They're currently setting the bar for low-cost, high quality residential installs at $2.01/Watt forcing the entire market to adapt. At these price points, no installer can afford to pay their sales team the traditional $.75/Watt they demand. The only reasons people aren't buying Tesla Solar hand over fist today is that without sales.....no one knows about it or understands the value. Resisting the impulse to reinstate a traditional sales process is the big indicator to me they're on the right path and determined to do this the right way.
That and the lack of service and communication are the only problems left. Each are easily overcome relative to fighting Warren Buffett and every state government for simple market access.
Should be fairly easy for Tesla to bridge all these gaps in 2021 IF they choose to. I think Elon equates "service" with "sales" since they were handled by the same group in the past, but he'll get past that eventually. Clear and consistent communication with customers about where they stand in the install process will be a huge help and is easy enough to build out internally.
As to how homeowners make the leap from enthusiastic interest to solar buyer more efficiently.....it's being worked on.
SemiS3XYR
Member
JRP3
Hyperactive Member
You can't build a bunker to last the thousands to millions of years needed for the planet to recover from such an event. You don't wait until it's "just in time". Also any ability to divert an object will depend on space travel. There is no rational reason for us to stop developing rockets. Interplanetary space travel is inevitable.
SemiS3XYR
Member
Why would you say that? Have you tried?
I didn’t say stop developing rockets. I just don’t think that’s human kind’s priority. Bill Gates is figuring out how to turn *sugar* into energy. We need to advance sustainability before tearing another planet apart or we may live in space forever. Who knows.
I didn’t say stop developing rockets. I just don’t think that’s human kind’s priority. Bill Gates is figuring out how to turn *sugar* into energy. We need to advance sustainability before tearing another planet apart or we may live in space forever. Who knows.
JRP3
Hyperactive Member
It's one of Elon's priorities. He's allowed to work on what interests him.
I found this very helpful, thanks @DaveT and Chicken Genius Singapore for going through this. I actually thought Dave’s points hold up better in light of Elon’s entrepreneurial dna & the foreseeable need to adjust the framework he operates in to support his pace of innovation.
CGP’s point of protecting retail investors from a foreseeable albeit temporary SP contraction feels a bit reminiscent of legacy OEM’s resistance to taking the right step in electrification. At 70, any extended SP contraction would definitely dent my plans, but the spirit of my original investment requires overriding any selfish aspiration. Dave’s point on the window of opportunity going away after a year or two brings a timeliness to the topic.
The idea is terrible because a megacorp with the vague and signally mission of "save humanity" would be extremely prone to mission creep, invasion by academics and powerpointers, wasteful side ventures, excess bureaucracy, etc.
Google's "don't be evil" has become a joke for this same reason.
It's about people. If you announce you are building the tower of Babel, you will attract all sorts of people with grand ideas and a sense of self-importance. If you have a defined goal like reusable spacecraft, you will attract engineers skilled in that line of work, and decline to hire everyone else.
Google's "don't be evil" has become a joke for this same reason.
It's about people. If you announce you are building the tower of Babel, you will attract all sorts of people with grand ideas and a sense of self-importance. If you have a defined goal like reusable spacecraft, you will attract engineers skilled in that line of work, and decline to hire everyone else.
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