Tesla Motors 2016 Annual Shareholder Meeting: Live feed

[Nevek]

They may have to start screening the questions for future sessions. When the gentleman asked Mr Musk how Solar City was going to address the theft of his bicycle during an install, the questions had really jumped the shark.

 

[Garlan Garner]

They may have to start screening the questions for future sessions. When the gentleman asked Mr Musk how Solar City was going to address the theft of his bicycle during an install, the questions had really jumped the shark.

LOL...I saw that. That was insane. I guess anyone can buy a share.

 

[zenmaster]

24 Tesla Shareholder Meeting Highlights — My Notes

We're live blogging Tesla's shareholder meeting

Tesla could triple the planned battery output of ‘Gigafactory 1’ to 150 GWh, says Elon Musk

 

[Owner]

Yawn, I almost fell asleep a few times. The history was way too drawn out, and really nothing new for us fans.

I can't quite figure out what they were thinking. Trying to combine a 10 year party with the shareholders meeting? Might have been interesting to people new to the Tesla world???

Although the questions were too wordy, they were more interesting than the meeting itself.

I did like that Elon clearly admitted that the X was over designed and should have just been without those falcon doors. I like that he admits his mistakes.

I also like that long term employees were acknowledged, but I didn't need to listen to them talk really. Maybe just a minute each not 5-10.

 

[Krugerrand]

They may have to start screening the questions for future sessions. When the gentleman asked Mr Musk how Solar City was going to address the theft of his bicycle during an install, the questions had really jumped the shark.

He was obviously really attached to his titanium bikes. I'd think a police report would be the way to go, which he may very well have done but didn't/doesn't have the proof that it was a Solar City employee that did the stealing. Secondarily, something that expensive might be best covered with insurance.

 

[dennis]

I attended the meeting in person and found it really interesting, even though I already knew most of the history. My takeaways:

1) Elon is still VERY engaged with Tesla - it is his baby. No danger of him stepping back when M3 ships

2) Unlike most CEO's, Elon is very willing to acknowledge mistakes and learn from them. Model X is the most recent example, but he highlighted many more from the Roadster days.

3) His soliloquy about rethinking manufacturing at the end of the presentation was the most telling. He's thinking about volumetric efficiency, linear efficiency, % of the factory floor that is occupied by the cars being built (just a few %). He sees big gains by taking some engineering talent that is looking for small incremental gains in efficiency of the car and applying that talent to finding large gains in producing the cars. This sounds a bit out there right now, but so did the Gigafactory when Elon first proposed it early 2014 and now there is a grand opening in 2 months.

4) It was nice for Elon to share the stage with some of the early employees and have them tell anecdotes and invite 50 or so up to the stage at the end of the presentation to be acknowledged.

This is not your average car company and that continues to be a huge competitive advantage for Tesla.

 

[Dutchie]

I thought there were quite interesting tidbits:
- the emphasis of the machine building the machine... There is apparently a whole lot to gain in efficiency in the production line,
- people are speculating about the technology going into the Model 3 with HUD's etc.. Elon said that the Model X and Model S are and will be technological front runners and that Model 3 will be following behind. I make out of that remark that there will be no spectacular HUD in the Model 3 unless it is introduced in the Model S and X before.
- there will be more "vegan" options with other colour combinations. He did not mention it literally, but judging on his response you can bet on it that it will happen.

 

[jsanford]

Did he talk about quality control refining/quality assurance at all, beyond the early Roadster days? It's a concern of mine after seeing a video review of the Model X with detached trim on the doors (otherwise the car was much loved).

 

[Electroman]

Most of the questions IMO were juvenile and silly.

There was one weak question about Tesla energy, but I would have rather asked some hard hitting questions what is the expected revenue for the next several years from selling powerwalls? After all the grand introduction and hype, we hardly heard anything about orders and sales in this product.

 

[Krugerrand]

There was one weak question about Tesla energy, but I would have rather asked some hard hitting questions what is the expected revenue for the next several years from selling powerwalls?

You can ask those questions, but you're not going to get an answer. They never give out product, revenue or such specific information. Ever. At best you get a general answer like the one about TE revenue expected to be equivalent to car revenue. So there you go, your question was answered today.

 

[ecarfan]

That meeting was weird. I wonder how the Tesla investors felt about it.

I was present at the shareholder's meeting and I loved it, even though I already knew over half of the information Elon and JB conveyed. It was like they were at my house just casually talking about the history of Tesla. And I liked the way Elon conveyed gratitude to the longstanding Tesla employees who were present in the room, and to the companies that played a key role in helping Tesla in the early days, like Daimler and Toyota. He was genuinely appreciative.

Apparently the board meeting folks were annoyed.

And you know that how?

 

[Drivin]

I attended the meeting in person and found it really interesting, even though I already knew most of the history. My takeaways:

1) Elon is still VERY engaged with Tesla - it is his baby. No danger of him stepping back when M3 ships

2) Unlike most CEO's, Elon is very willing to acknowledge mistakes and learn from them. Model X is the most recent example, but he highlighted many more from the Roadster days.
.

It is sad that we have such low expectations for CEOs, politicians and other leaders that we get excited when someone does nothing except acknowledges a mistake.

Real leaders fix their mistakes.

I laugh when I hear the "I take full responsibility" line.
Will you fix it. No
Will you forfeit your bonus? No
Will it have any impact on you at all? No

Well, thanks for taking responsibility then.

 

[Drivin]

Did he talk about quality control refining/quality assurance at all, beyond the early Roadster days? It's a concern of mine after seeing a video review of the Model X with detached trim on the doors (otherwise the car was much loved).

What was amusing was the guy who said he had information and concerns for the board but didn't want to share it publicly. Way to step up there!

 

[Dr ValueSeeker]

It is sad that we have such low expectations for CEOs, politicians and other leaders that we get excited when someone does nothing except acknowledges a mistake.

Real leaders fix their mistakes.

I laugh when I hear the "I take full responsibility" line.
Will you fix it. No
Will you forfeit your bonus? No
Will it have any impact on you at all? No

Well, thanks for taking responsibility then.

Great post! I suppose, Mr. Musk knows his fan club is just too forgiving and will take his words forever to be gospels.
His mistakes with Model X didn't stop him from cashing his option grants tied to Model X success. In fact, the options could partly be the reason for a rushed Model x delivery.

 

[dennis]

His mistakes with Model X didn't stop him from cashing his option grants tied to Model X success. In fact, the options could partly be the reason for a rushed Model x delivery.

The options Musk exercised, which were set to expire in Dec 2016, were granted in 2006, when there were no plans as yet for the Model X. The options Musk earned related to the Model X milestones were part of the 2012 stock plan.

Nice try.

 

[diamond.g]

And you know that how?

It was the way Elon kept saying they had meetings after this please keep questions short. But I could have been reading into his tone too much.

 

[Jayc]

I think Elon is doing a fantastic job and Tesla is what it is today because of him.

Do we even bother to follow CEOs of other car manufacturers and their interviews? I think not and one reason is that they mostly operate at a very high level e.g. design directions, efficiency targets and product roadmaps - most of them are too disconnected with end customers and wouldn't dare do question and answer sessions with their customers and I bet won't even know details of specific products if asked.

Listen to EM and it will always be very specific details right down to bare metal implementation of end products and their features - it does not get any better than that let me tell you.

 

[SΞXY P100D]

Some EM bashing going on in this thread, I see... Maybe they'll be better at building electric supercars, self-landing rockets, gigafactory, and supercharger network themselves, and all at the same time. Maybe they'll be more open and honest, and man up to admitting past mistakes.

 

[AZ Desert Driver]

Sure . . . but that's not what you normally do in a shareholder meeting. Most investors are wanting info pertaining to products in the pipeline, margins, deliveries on track or behind, etc. etc. Each to his own.

If you guys attend the Berkshire-Hathaway meeting you get to see Warren Buffet do the same thing. These meetings are FUN, compared to others that are just-the-facts. I hope he does similar again.
History is a good thing to review - perhaps not quite so much, but it does establish why we are where we are. I appreciated hearing the humility of Elon - "I designed the Roadster- yep that was mostly me - and Im not very good at it". That gives me a lot of confidence. I am not expecting perfection in the man, or the machine that builds the machine. I'm expecting a good faith effort from the team. This was delivered in Spades.

 

[AZ Desert Driver]

I was thinking the same thing.

Warren Buffet got blindsided a few years ago during a open-mic Q&A. Next year, he had a fellow collect all the questions in advance and asked Warren only those that passed muster. Elon will learn that there are gadflys that want to buy tee shirts or advance Union claims or bring up Solar City - and it is not hard to honor the good questions and weed out the gadfly.