Speculative Tesla owned Uber-like service impact on Tesla's Mission and Valuation?

[Dollardragon]

The first time it comes back full of vomit is the last time you do it. I would hate to need my car for a scheduled event and be force to do a massive clean on short order or any time for that matter. On the other hand, for some it could be done as a business with no problems.

I like the idea of driverless car service, the snag in this is the customer who is distructive by nature. They exist. So it would need to be much like UBER in that there is no customer anonymity, and there would need to be interior sensors to monitor for smells and such to take a car offline for a quick clean when necessary. This would be neither expensive nor difficult in the big picture.

 

[Johan]

Time to resurrect this thread?!?

Elon's comments when in Norway yesterday were interesting, to say the least, when considering this topic. I'll just make a cross-post here of my translation of one of the news articles from Norwegian media mentioning his comments, that were vague to say the least but nevertheless...

Musk is in Norway. This is what TU ("Technical Weekly") say in their article, Elon Musk: - Derfor har ikke Tesla satset på hydrogenbiler

"We have an idea, which isn't exactly a buss, but something that could solve the problem of dense traffic in city centres. I think we have to re-imagine the concept of collective transport, and create something that people will like better [than today]. I don't want to talk too much about it.

- I have to be careful with what I choose to say, Musk said, and remarked that even small comments from him will often tend to become big news in the international press.

But he is talking about a new type of vehicle with the purpose of bringing people [the whole way] to their final destinations.

- Driverless cars play a key role, Musk says."

I want to try to find some video interviews and not just read the second hand info on this stuff. Interesting indeed.

 

[jhm]

Yes, I think Musk is thinking more about reinventing public transport than following the Uber paradigm. So my vision is to have an autonomous vans with 2, 3 or 4 compartments that each hold upto three occupants. Each compartment is enclosed for privacy, safety, and social comfort. So while the vehicle is able to transport multiple riders at the same time to distinct destinations, you have your own private compartmemt. You can play your own music, watch your own video, have your own conversations, etc.This alone makes it much nicer than than taking a bus. The compartments may also be separated with bulletproof materials and hospital grade HEPA filters for added physical safety from violence and airborne microbes. Because this is an autonomous vehicle, there is no driver present to assure a level of saftey. So if you're going to carry multiple groups of passengers, you've got to design safety and privacy into the vehicle itself. People need to feel very safe sharing the vehicle with strangers. So it's not enough just to put a Model X into public service. The design needs to be optimized for public service.

In addition to separate compartments, I would expect this van to have falcon wing doors for each compartment. This makes for optimal ease of access which is important for accomodating passengers who may have physical limitations. Indeed a ramp can come out below while the door opens above, allowing passengers to roll right in if need be. Also with doors opening vertically rather than horizontally, this maximizes the horizontal space for entering parallel compartments. All this optimizes the process of loading and unloading. It needs to be quick and easy to minimize time and aggrivation to all riders. An ordinary van is actually quite difficult to load and unload. Riders need to be physically nimble enough to contort their way into a back seat. This is why shuttles and busses have much more vertical space. So if you want a good public vehicle at the size of a van, smaller than a shuttle, you need very good design efficiency. So falcon wing doors could have enormous design advantages. The whole roof above a compartment can be lifted to provide vertical space while loading and unloading.

 

[replicant]

The design needs to be optimized for public service.

Could it be also optimized for freight? Elon could re-invent the concept of containerization by applying it to pods for both passengers and cargo.

How many miles are driven to transport goods vs persons? Once the cost per mile is significantly lower for EV compared to ICE, delivery companies could switch faster than individuals. If Elon's idea is modular and can transport both people and goods at once, it could trigger a nice virtuous circle.

 

[ludicrousspeed]

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=1131390106911833

Came across this this video today, not affiliated with Tesla but still cool to see how it could look.

 

[replicant]

Sterling [Anderson] has spent the better part of the last decade questioning the "how" of autonomous vehicle development. He spent much of this time at MIT, where his work in shared autonomy generated nearly $2M in research funding, four patents, several academic publications and hundreds of print and online articles worldwide. He has since launched two companies, advised several others as a management consultant with McKinsey and Company and currently leads the Model X program at Tesla Motors.

At 15:29, he shares his vision of a world with autonomous fleet of electric vehicles:

In 30 years, very few are likely to own a car.

Imagine for a moment a world in which cars can drive themselves. Now imagine that you've re-purposed your garage for a new bedroom, a new room in your house. All of the land — in fact there's a lot of it obviously — dedicated to parking has now been re-purposed for other facilities. There's a "roving band" if you will, a sort of migrating horde of electric shared vehicles operating in any urban or suburban environment, positioning itself next to centers of demand, such that with the press of a button on your mobile phone, a car is there to pick up 95% of the population in less than a minute. You get in the car, it drives you to where you wanna go, you get out of the door and you're done.

This vision of autonomy is much more cost-effective for you because we've leveraged a lot of economies of scale. For instance, these cars in down periods — in off-peak periods of the day when not a lot of folks are commuting — re-purpose themselves. They drive themselves to fulfillment centers, to post offices and other locations where they can do last-mile deliveries and things. At night, the part of the fleet that is not used or is under-utilized drives itself out of town, to really cheap areas where it drives itself through a car wash, it cleans itself, parks itself, charges up and is out the next morning to pick people up and move them around the city centers.

By our estimates, in several urban environments, about one of these shared vehicles could replace about four personally owned ones. It does amazing things for the environment, it does amazing things for us, it’s cheaper on an average basis to use one of this than to own a car.

That’s the future that I think we’re moving to.

Note that he's now Tesla's director of autopilot programs.

 

[SteveG3]

with SMP2, Elon has made it clear ride sharing by owners and a dedicated Tesla fleet in some urban areas are part of the plan.

there are some aspects that still may not be in our interest to call attention to, but if anyone's curious, Adam Jonas mentioned what in my view is the one key word in a report a few weeks ago. it's no accident that other automakers are setting up alliances in this area... there is a mammoth business opportunity out there, and it will be likely be fiercely competed for at a surprising pace (I think the pace of competition here will be absurdly faster than the incumbents foot dragging towards EVs).

 

[SteveG3]

(beyond what last night suggests as to the lead Tesla already has in developing this technology) Tesla basically just added a third leg to it's outstanding strategic position in the massively lucrative coming autonomous ride sharing service market. we have,

1) mystery moat (pretty big hint: consider Tesla's position in the EV market in addition to the urban environments autonomous ride sharing will have its largest demand and largest environmental impact, and what entities will often have a decisive role in licensing fleets of providers)

2) data, data, data

3) from this week forward, Tesla builds a lead in cars in the real world with hardware for autonomy. that is, all the other automakers are now in catch up mode to having a fleet of vehicles in place when regulators in the various regions approve autonomous vehicles.

 

[SBenson]

Maybe the thread title can now be changed to remove the word "Speculative" ?

 

[BornToFly]

Maybe the thread title can now be changed to remove the word "Speculative" ?

Yes, and we can add at least $60 Billion to the market cap.

 

[SteveG3]

(beyond what last night suggests as to the lead Tesla already has in developing this technology) Tesla basically just added a third leg to it's outstanding strategic position in the massively lucrative coming autonomous ride sharing service market. we have,

1) mystery moat (pretty big hint: consider Tesla's position in the EV market in addition to the urban environments autonomous ride sharing will have its largest demand and largest environmental impact, and what entities will often have a decisive role in licensing fleets of providers)

2) data, data, data

3) from this week forward, Tesla builds a lead in cars in the real world with hardware for autonomy. that is, all the other automakers are now in catch up mode to having a fleet of vehicles in place when regulators in the various regions approve autonomous vehicles.

and mystery moat (see 1) above) cracks the surface a little

http://www.bizjournals.com/tampabay...artners-with-hillsborough-transit-agency.html

added hint: think "utility"

 

[SteveG3]

as Green Pete posted in the short-term thread, more details on this program in the Tampa area... sounds like they will start with the van/bus like product based on the Model X platform that Elon has talked about,

"The vehicle type has not been determined because the project is still in its early stages, however passengers will ride in something smaller than a bus but larger than a car, HART said."

http://www.bizjournals.com/tampabay...borough-transit-eyes-a-driverless-future.html

 

[Bankroetlama]

funny to see this thread back, with what we know now

 

[SteveG3]

Ford has now gone quite public (excerpts and links below) with what looks to me to be the other race in the advent of autonomous ride sharing, negotiating regulated access to market share in large urban areas with local governments . I think these urban areas will run the gamut from essentially no regulation of who has fleets in their city to effectively utility like domination by a few player, in some cases possibly one player, licensed by the urban area in exchange for meeting service benchmarks, and likely a cut of the very substantial profits.

Ford, Apple and others will have the influence (selling point, if you will) of their size and decades long networks of connection. Tesla will have the influence of an all electric drivetrain, a very substantial selling point in these urban areas. For the regional governments that do inject themselves into regulating the coming tide of autonomous ride sharing vehicles, it's likely to come down to more or less cronyism vs. the environment, air quality in their city.

Of course, who gets to legal autonomy earliest will be a core factor in who ends up with the most market share... but, this "other race" looks to be critical as well. The extent to which Tesla has vastly more EV production capacity circa 2020 than any other automaker will act a moat to their gaining market share in urban areas that choose a provider based on environmental impact (this is the mystery moat I've referred to in the past- municipalities regulating the presence of autonomous ride sharing fleets with a preference for EVs).

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some excerpts from Ford's recent comments,

today,

"The second-largest U.S. automaker is raising new cash as it looks at the changing landscape in transportation. Ford is working with cities around the world to come up with transportation solutions that go beyond selling cars to individual drivers and include vehicle sharing, ride hailing and other modes of mobility.

The world's middle class will double over the next 15 years, as more people crowd into huge urban centers, which would create global gridlock if everyone is driving their own car. So the carmaker has promised to put 100,000 robot taxis — without steering wheels and gas and brake pedals — on the road in five years. It's also investing $4.5 billion to convert 40% of its lineup to electrified vehicles by 2020 and is offering bike-sharing and a commuter-van services in San Francisco."

note: they are spending on electrified vehicles, not necessarily electric vehicles

Ford To Take On $2.8 Billion In Debt To Develop Futuristic Cars

The LA Auto Show keynote speech by Ford CEO Mark Fields last month,

"Or think about this: What would a city look like if more people were using shared services versus personally-owned vehicles?

At Ford, we’ve seen how exciting and liberating it is to imagine the future of mobility in this way. And from our vantage point, cities carry the biggest rewards and risks as we create this City of Tomorrow.

That’s why we created the Ford City Solutions team to work with cities around the world to help map the future, starting with San Francisco and growing from there. We know every city is unique, with different needs and unique transportation challenges. Instead of offering a single set of solutions to all cities, we’re working with each city directly to identify the needs of its citizens and tailor transportation solutions for them."

https://www.trucks.com/2016/11/15/2016-la-auto-show-ford-ceo-keynote/

 

[Gerardf]

One more datapoint to show how much impact on jobs autonomous trucks will have.

Map: The Most Common* Job In Every State

In it is an animation that runs from 1978 to 2014.

 

[SteveG3]

How much focus is Ford putting into positioning itself for partnerships with large cities for the massive revenues to come from autonomous fleets?

1) over half of their Detroit Auto Show presentation was on the subject (Bill Ford begins speaking generally about this at 13:40 mark of linked video, CEO Mark Fields at 16:40)

2) in this presentation, via video, they included 3-term NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg (20 minutes in), whose Bloomberg Philanthropies, in partnership with Ford and the Aspen Institute, is working on an initiative to engage cities around the world on planning and implementing the future of mobility. The ten cities they are already working with include, Los Angeles, Paris, London, Sao Paulo, Washington, and Buenos Aires.

3) the presentation also included Aspen Institute President and CEO Walter Isaacson coming on stage (23:50 into the video) to discuss his institute's partnership with Ford and Bloomberg's work. Fields and Ford were on stage with Isaacson for this discussion.

4) Ford then announced three different events they are hosting today on this subject,

a) A TED event ("The Future of Mobility")
b) A New York Times event ("City of Tomorrow: The Mayors Perspective) with the Mayors of Chicago, Atlanta, Detroit, and Columbus)
c) Vice ("Living and Working in the City of Tomorrow")

It's not certain that any particular city is going to regulate which and how many autonomous fleets operate in their city, but it seems improbable that this will not be the case in some instances. Ford seems to be moving like no one else to use the "crony" network, "schmooze" tools, and first mover benefits, to work their way into a large piece of this tremendously profitable business of the future (first mover as in partnering, not a comment re autonomous tech position). Just listen for how many times Mark Fields uses the word "partnership" as he talks. I think Ford sees two things... something along the lines of being a utility, and giant dollar signs. fwiw, I believe the EV powertrain gives Tesla a unique opportunity to position themselves for these kinds of partnerships as cities don't just want to lower congestion, they want to lower pollution.

Unlike the move to EVs where ICE makers can punt, at least in the case of Ford, it's clear there's a sense of a race for positioning in large urban areas.

 

[Bankroetlama]

The first version of this Tesla initiative will not be an Uber competitor. I imagine it will be like car2go (from Mercedes) and DriveNow (from BMW). You have free floating cars in the city, and people can use the nearest one and pay by the minute/kilometer.

 

[SteveG3]

The first version of this Tesla initiative will not be an Uber competitor. I imagine it will be like car2go (from Mercedes) and DriveNow (from BMW). You have free floating cars in the city, and people can use the nearest one and pay by the minute/kilometer.

sure, I could see that. that said, within five years or so, it looks like Uber, Tesla, and nearly all major efforts will be converging on offering networks of autonomous vehicles. likely some of these fleets will include consumer owned vehicles, some wont.

 

[Green Pete]

sure, I could see that. that said, within five years or so, it looks like Uber, Tesla, and nearly all major efforts will be converging on offering networks of autonomous vehicles. likely some of these fleets will include consumer owned vehicles, some wont.

I see any attempt for a company to launch proprietary vehicle fleets when another company is launching consumer owned vehicles as a losing game.

Example:
Tesla sells 500,000 model 3s, half end up being autonomous taxis at 250,000 vehicles it would rival Ubers current fleet. Tesla makes a margin selling each car and a margin on their share of the taxi service. Upfront cost: paid for already at this point. Daily inspection performed by vehicle owners who likely will get car cleaning service when needed.

Uber partners with Toyota to put 250,000 taxis on the road, average cost of 40k per car. Upfront cost: 10 billion dollar investment. Daily inspection performed by newly hired staff of people hired to check up on cars.

Consumer owned cars might not be long term profitable, but the cash Tesla could pull in during the first few years could pay for their self owned fleet. And considering their percieved lead on self driving tech, by the time tesla is rolling out their own cars and has few hundred thousand cars owned by consumers other companies may be ready to start rolling out their own cars, way behind on market share.

The only lead anyone has right now is tesla doesnt have people using an app so theyll have to get people to use it. But I get the feeling people will tell all their friends about this new app thats half the cost of uber where a self driving car drives you around pretty heavily.

 

[Bgarret]

Thought people might enjoy this white paper by Ark Investments. If you download and read all 40 pages, there are some strong conclusions - i.e. Mobility as a Service should be valued at roughly 2X all current OEMs or about $2Trillion and that gas powered vehicle companies valuation will trend toward inconsequential sooner rather than later.

Enjoy.

White Paper: Why Self-Driving Cars Could Change Everything