Tesla, TSLA & the Investment World: the Perpetual Investors' Roundtable

[Artful Dodger]

Opening the SC network to others....

• I don’t think this is beyond speculation yet, but I will play...after all it’s a healthy discussion
• As a greedy shareholder, I don’t always agree to the mission with Elon’s conviction
• I feel that the SC network is a substantial advantage to Tesla that is often under appreciated...I don’t want to lose this for Tesla and sales
• SC buildout has cost Tesla and shareholders valuable capital over the years, it’s hard for me to even imagine adequate compensation to be justified IMO
• I would LOVE for someone to share some basic math behind a typical SC and ROI. I think Tesla subsidizes SCs because the amount charged doesn’t even/barely covers the local electricity fees. What about initial capital and maintenance?
• As a Tesla owner, if I roll up to a SC without an open stall and VW or ? are occupying stalls, charging at an inferior (slow) rate....
• I *LOVE* SC network and don’t want to screw the experience up. Not sure how to open it up without compromising the experience I so enjoy. For some reason I am too emotional about this topic!

Okay, remember a Century ago when only "amateur" athletes were eligible to compete in the Olympic Games?

Then, remember in 1984 how the USA "Dream Team" won Gold in Men's Basketball? Michael Jordan, Patrick Ewing, Wayman Tisdale, and the other Pro's all played ball.

Now, where do you think Tesla should be competing in the future? In the NBA, or in the G League?

Yeah, I thought so...

Cheers!

TL;dr "Go for the Gold: Higher, Faster; Stronger"

 

[CorneliusXX]

From comments here and on Twitter, many are complaining that Tesla shouldn't open its supercharger to third party brands.

However, I originally thought that SC was always bound to open up at a certain point or would cease to exist once EV stations become common.

The reason is simple... scale. Right now, SC makes sense to be proprietary because Tesla needed that to push EV forward. We are already at a point where most legacy makers are pulling the trigger on the switch, however slow that is.

Thus, opening now is actually a great timing. It'd still make people to buy Tesla (no adapter needed. Just plug and go), and as more and more EVs start using SC, it makes financial sense for Tesla to invest into faster, bigger, and/or simply more SC locations. Because right now, there are already quite a few SC location that sit empty or never reached peak at any point in life. They aren't exactly cheap to put together either. At a suggested 170k per station, a 10 stall station is a million-dollar project each.

Imagine being the largest car maker and "gas" station operator in the world.

I agree. The supercharger network is a sunk cost - tesla has already spent the cash to build it out. Most of the time this asset sits around being unused, so any incremental usage is basically pure margin (price charged to the customer minus cost of electricity). It should help firm up the revenues both from usage and potentially from subscription by non Tesla EV owners. From a financial standpoint I think it's a great idea to increase profits and capital efficiency.

Regarding competition - If you believe that EVs in general will be supply constrained for the next decade then there shouldn't be too much concern with opening up the network. It might create some small pockets of increased competition (e.g. Marques Brownlee said in his taycan review that he would get the Porsche if the charging network was better). But looking at how competitive Tesla is in terms of innovation and manufacturing efficiency I'd back them to continue to create the best value EVs in the market.

Who knows what else will evolve from a wider customer base for the supercharger network, but there are plenty of potential upsides:

• Access to government funds for expansion (improving quality for Tesla and non-Tesla customers both)
• More focus on ancillary services (e.g. retail stores like gridserv is doing in the UK, possibly display stores for solar/battery packs)
• Justification to spend more on solar/storage at charging locations due to increased ROI
• Potential to spin out a minority share of the network and increase the valuation of Tesla (it's not really modelled into any price targets I've seen)
• A greater moat against competing charging infrastructure as customers already have access to the best network which is growing at a faster rate

 

[CorneliusXX]

Elon deleted this tweet:

View attachment 648088

:O :O

Wow! The use of probably instead of possibly is encouraging that there is a legitimate step change coming. It also dovetails with the comments from the all hand meeting of "think bigger".

But it's pretty difficult to see what could create that kind of bump while Tesla is still cell constrained. Even if they had perfect FSD tomorrow it would take years for Tesla to build enough cars to create a large AV network.

Anywho, I'm going to move from the center to the edge of my seat just to be safe.

 

[MartinAustin]

If he deleted it... well.. it's back

https://twitter.com/x/status/1375361401447927810

 

[elasalle]

there is > 0% chance we will be green Today

 

[Tslynk67]

Elon deleted this tweet:

View attachment 648088

:O :O

Elon deleted that last response, not the rest

 

[ByeByeJohnny]

Wow, he doesn't even know the difference between TMC and Reddit? (Or did someone on Reddit post a screen capture of the TMC post?)

If we are turning into WallStreetBets I'm gonna be DFV. You all can be the r*t*rds.

 

[Pezpunk]

Elon deleted that last response, not the rest

right, that's what i meant. Sorry for the confusion.

 

[Tslynk67]

If we are turning into WallStreetBets I'm gonna be DFV. You all can be the r*t*rds.

You and your wife's boyfriend...

right, that's what i meant. Sorry for the confusion.

I think that tweet would be viewed dimly by the SUC and seized upon by the usual detractors

 

[Baumisch]

Elon deleted this tweet:

View attachment 648088

:O :O

I read this as "Probably within a few months we will understand why he thinks >0% chance of biggest company" not that in a few months Tesla is the biggest compandy - this would imply a >5x in a few months

 

[Buckminster]

TSLA up 0.4% since "The tweet". We are on track to 4X by June!

 

[Pezpunk]

I think that tweet would be viewed dimly by the SUC and seized upon by the usual detractors

i agree. i'm conflicted whether i even should have posted it here.

 

[RobStark]

BEV D Segment

BEV E-F Segment

Europe February 2021

Electric and plug-in hybrid car sales rankings

ev-sales.blogspot.com

 

[Tslynk67]

i agree. i'm conflicted whether i even should have posted it here.

Don't worry, it will have been screen-shotted by the enemy as soon as it was posted...

 

[lascavarian]

i agree. i'm conflicted whether i even should have posted it here.

That’s interesting. I admit I had the same thought initially. The problem, IMO, is Twitter in it’s intentional design for starters. Any erasure only amplifies things. Why pretend things can be erased? It is one of the many deceptions of the product IMO.

 

[ByeByeJohnny]

I think that tweet would be viewed dimly by the SUC and seized upon by the usual detractors

Why? He said nothing that indicates if Teslas shareprice will go up or down.

If Elon thinks all the other companies including Apple will fall he can say that. He has no inside info regarding that they will fall to under $600 billion. Actually, in the context he might only have meant Apple in the 'biggest company' comparison. So unless Steve Jobs ghost came to him and told him inside info about Apples coming fall Elon revealed no inside info. Certainly not about Tesla.

 

[UkNorthampton]

Seems like Tesla will offer an adapter + app solution for non-Teslas to allow them to charge on the Supercharger network. This will require a Tesla account.

Assuming this is true, Tesla will likely bring a lot of business to the Supercharger network from people who don't own Teslas. This will also bring those non-Tesla owners into the Tesla sales and marketing system. This will lead to more Tesla sales, for obvious reasons.

If the companies that aren't Tesla choose to block the adapter somehow, this will lead to bad opinions of the companies. Imagine being blocked from a shell owned gas station on a road trip.

If people still choose to go to Electrify America instead of the Supercharger network, at least some of that EA revenue still goes to Tesla, since they're supplying them with battery packs.

How do you compete against this?

Probably not a popular point to make to USA/Canada people, but Tesla changed their chargers to CCS in Europe. My knowledge isn't perfect as much of the work was done before I got my car & I haven't used a Supercharger in UK for a long time.

Tesla initially added CCS cables to existing chargers, so both available. Then removed old connectors or only fitted CCS on new ones.

Early on in owning a Model 3 (CCS), I managed to find a site with only old-style Tesla/non CCS connectors when I was at 4% charge & had my only range anxiety as I made my way to another one that I hoped had CCS.

My understanding is that Model S/X owners were offered chargeable (£ not electrons) CCS conversions (please correct me if I'm wrong). I don't think any current Europe Supercharger sites are non-CCS, but others will know better than me.

Edit: see @samppa post below for more accurate info - Tesla, TSLA & the Investment World: the Perpetual Investors' Roundtable

 

[samppa]

Probably not a popular point to make to USA/Canada people, but Tesla changed their chargers to CCS in Europe. My knowledge isn't perfect as much of the work was done before I got my car & I haven't used a Supercharger in UK for a long time.

Tesla initially added CCS cables to existing chargers, so both available. Then removed old connectors or only fitted CCS on new ones.

Early on in owning a Model 3 (CCS), I managed to find a site with only old-style Tesla/non CCS connectors when I was at 4% charge & had my only range anxiety as I made my way to another one that I hoped had CCS.

My understanding is that Model S/X owners were offered chargeable (£ not electrons) CCS conversions (please correct me if I'm wrong). I don't think any current Europe Supercharger sites are non-CCS, but others will know better than me.

All v2 superchargers in europe have both Tesla modified type2 and the new added CCS cable.
V3 superchargers have only CCS. For some time, new S/X has come with CCS adapter with the car.
For older cars the CCS retrofit costs about 300€.

 

[j6Lpi429@3j]

TBH I cant see tesla opening up the network. There is little to gain and a lot to lose.

Gains:
Better awareness of how reliable and fast they are to other EV owners.
Some revenue.

Losses:
Tesla owners no longer have the cachet of a network 'just for us'.
Possible outrage and having to queue for a spot behind a non tesla to use 'your' charger.
Disincentives build-out of more EV chargers by other companies (hurts the mission).
Little control over how much pressure this puts on the network, capacity wise. No longer linked to tesla sales.
Disincentive to buyers. Why buy a tesla 'for the Suc network' when you can now use it anyway?

I think doing so would be a net negative and a distraction. Its not vaguely a priority. Priorities should be:

1. Build more model Ys
2. Get GF texas built
3. Get GF Berlin built
4. Start making semis.
5. Ship the flipping roadster because its getting embarrassing how much this is vaporware now.

 

[UkNorthampton]

TBH I cant see tesla opening up the network. There is little to gain and a lot to lose.

Gains:
Better awareness of how reliable and fast they are to other EV owners.
Some revenue.

Losses:
Tesla owners no longer have the cachet of a network 'just for us'.
Possible outrage and having to queue for a spot behind a non tesla to use 'your' charger.
Disincentives build-out of more EV chargers by other companies (hurts the mission).
Little control over how much pressure this puts on the network, capacity wise. No longer linked to tesla sales.
Disincentive to buyers. Why buy a tesla 'for the Suc network' when you can now use it anyway?

I think doing so would be a net negative and a distraction. Its not vaguely a priority. Priorities should be:

1. Build more model Ys
2. Get GF texas built
3. Get GF Berlin built
4. Start making semis.
5. Ship the flipping roadster because its getting embarrassing how much this is vaporware now.

Gains:
Access to PRIME land (planning, government owned, only available to open networks)
Access to funding
Full production / expansion for Superchargers factories China (10,000 a year) & USA production