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

[Unpilot]

I can say with certainty that the visible side of the car was blue.

When you looked at it.

 

[JBRR]

Porsche won't be able to change quickly because they are rather horizontal integrated than vertical. As I pointed out in my latest article at CleanTechnica it is a not fully understood huge advantage of Tesla to have a deep vertical integration and they did it because they had to not because they wanted to.

The German auto industry including Porsche has a proven Model that is almost worthless today and a burden if an agile company like Tesla comes around with a new superior technology.

The inflexibility to change quickly is a backed in disadvantage that has many reasons and can't be changed easily. It will take time to do so if they are able to at all and will cost time and a fortune.

Right now in Sindelfingen there will be a level of frustration and disbelieve that Tesla pulled the plaid out of the sleeve and simply embarrassed them. This is just the start and the plaid production vehicle will do even better and the Roadster next level.

I believe the approach to put two gears in the Taycan was another strategic mistake ignoring the experiences Tesla went through in the early days. I have 1st hand sources confirming the arrogance of Porsche engineers not listening nor learning. Its a cultural problem that leads to inflexibility and that what I call the Taycan disaster.

Premium prices are now not longer justified for the Taycan and likely not for the next BEVs of Porsche and with that their strategy is imploding. I believe Porsche has a very hard awakening in front of them.

Excerpt from https://smile.amazon.com/What-About-Future-Perspectives-Forecasting/dp/3030261646

From this study:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2444569X18300039

 

[VValleyEV]

Fortune published a tiny piece quoting Bill Gates as recommending that wind and solar subsidies be dropped, shifting the subsidies to other emerging renewable energy technologies.

Why Bill Gates Thinks It’s Time to End Subsidies for Wind and Solar Power

No questions posed about whether it might be better to eliminate the massive subsidies for the petroleum industry that dwarf all this piddly renewable stuff.

 

[madodel]

Porsche won't be able to change quickly because they are rather horizontal integrated than vertical. As I pointed out in my latest article at CleanTechnica it is a not fully understood huge advantage of Tesla to have a deep vertical integration and they did it because they had to not because they wanted to.

The German auto industry including Porsche has a proven Model that is almost worthless today and a burden if an agile company like Tesla comes around with a new superior technology.

The inflexibility to change quickly is a backed in disadvantage that has many reasons and can't be changed easily. It will take time to do so if they are able to at all and will cost time and a fortune.

Right now in Sindelfingen there will be a level of frustration and disbelieve that Tesla pulled the plaid out of the sleeve and simply embarrassed them. This is just the start and the plaid production vehicle will do even better and the Roadster next level.

I believe the approach to put two gears in the Taycan was another strategic mistake ignoring the experiences Tesla went through in the early days. I have 1st hand sources confirming the arrogance of Porsche engineers not listening nor learning. Its a cultural problem that leads to inflexibility and that what I call the Taycan disaster.

Premium prices are now not longer justified for the Taycan and likely not for the next BEVs of Porsche and with that their strategy is imploding. I believe Porsche has a very hard awakening in front of them.

I mean anyone that has seen the movie knows that the only thing faster than Ludicrous is Plaid. Did they really think Tesla would never develop Plaid? Don't they have SpaceBalls on German Hulu?

 

[EVNow]

My guess is that Tesla might have toned down the FSD promises in later versions of EAP, and is tracking those orders and delivery milestones separately?

I'm pretty sure they are tracking deferred revenue on a per VIN and per specific configuration and EAP/FSD/Autopilot version basis, which should be capable of capturing such complexities on the database level.

Sorry for the confusion - here I'm talking about Early Access Program.

 

[EVNow]

Fortune published a tiny piece quoting Bill Gates as recommending that wind and solar subsidies be dropped, shifting the subsidies to other emerging renewable energy technologies.

Why Bill Gates Thinks It’s Time to End Subsidies for Wind and Solar Power

No questions posed about whether it might be better to eliminate the massive subsidies for the petroleum industry that dwarf all this piddly renewable stuff.

This kind of "free market" orthodoxy is going to get all humans killed.

 

[Carl Raymond]

I imagine if it does anything significant for racing, a whole lot of races will start adding explicit bans on air thrusters, since it changes what car racing means in a pretty significant way.

Also incredibly dangerous if not done with barge landing precision.

Imagine you are half way round a high g bend where only the thrusters are holding you in and down, and you lose thrust... You would set a record, for the size of the debris field.

 

[MarcusMaximus]

I'm now curious about the difference between the Blue and Red Plaid prototypes...

Perhaps they are an identical car, and Tesla is playing it safe by having 2 cars available.

Or perhaps one of them is a "base model" with a smaller battery and smaller motors.

We will have to wait to be told officially, but if one is faster, my money is on the Red, but perhaps that is just the color making a difference

You take the blue car - the story ends, you wake up in your Taycan and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red car - you stay in Wonderland and Tesla shows you how deep the rabbit hole goes.

 

[MarcusMaximus]

Wow, I wonder what Greta thinks of this.

What’s his next trick to undermine the next generation - bring back the incandescent light bulb?

Not sure if joking, but Trump has actually suggested we should bring back the incandescent light bulb.

 

[MP3Mike]

Oh, and remember that dispute earlier over whether Turbo S could be gotten with summer tires on the Mission E wheels at all (let alone the specific ones they raced on)? There wasn't any disagreement at all that the Turbo can't.

Now they are saying that the problem is we are looking at the US site, and if you order from the German site even the Turbo comes with summer tires. (I tried to use translators to look at the site and I couldn't find anywhere that specified the type of tires that came with the 21" Mission E wheels.)

 

[Mars ☰mperor]

Have you watched that video where the lap record was set and seen anything about the car that did that lap? It's an actual race car - not something that pretends anywhere to be anything except a race car. I think it's either one of their Le Mans cars, or comes from that world.

Here we go: Porsche 919 Hybrid - Wikipedia

It's a Le Mans LMP1 class car. If I read the page correctly, at least a 2 time winner ('16, '17).

I think that talking and thinking about Roadster 2 as being competitive with a full on race car over anything other than a straight line acceleration, quarter mile, or similar is enjoying the Kool-Aid a bit too much.

(Sidebar - you really gotta watch the video. Reading the Youtube comments is also funny - any number of people commenting that they thought they'd goofed and set the replay to 1.5x or 2.0x, but nope - it was 1.0x. Plenty more people commenting they can't go that fast in their car racing video game )


Better / faster than any other production car that's been taken to the 'Ring - that I can readily believe.

Meh. I watched it at 0.75x speed and it ran an unremarkable 7:05.33

That's utterly insane.

The top speed is impressive as I would expect it to be running quite a lot of down force to be able to corner that fast.

I wonder, do these cars have DRS systems like F1, any idea?

Interesting line around The Carousel too - all the way around the outside, I always took it on the inside camber, but hard to control the car around it then.

Thanks for posting the video - I think I've watched it 3 or 4 times now over the last few months. This last time, I think I saw the car drop under 100 km/h around 1 corner. Using the overhead map they helpfully supply, that "corner", looks like a 180 degree hairpin where the road folds on itself. Sure - I'd drop under 60 mph (instead of the 10 or 15 that is sane) for that too.

Yeah - that's well described as "horrifyingly fast".

It seriously is crazy fast.
The top comment of this video is too funny:
"I wore my helmet while watching this video just to be safe"

 

[Rb48888]

IMHO, This is a great opportunity for Tesla. to develop light way "racing seats" for plaid s/x/roadster and rotor/pad/caliper/tire combinations. and sell a competition package for the Model 3 in order fo the seats to benefit from Economy of scale slightly by offering it on a $25K+ package on the P3D. HUGE Margin car.

This.

While we're dreaming, a plaid-inspired high-flow lower grille for that Model 3 competition package too, please.

I'd like people to think of the world's fastest production sedan when they see me coming.

 

[lascavarian]

To add on...there's absolutely zero reason to not give a price range, for example mid 130's, for the Plaid version.

Disagree. There is no reason to have any discussion beyond only the most vague of terms. In this case fear and uncertainty are your friend. I am mystified they are even giving it any discussion. For all we know this thing could grenade after a couple hard days.

 

[StarFoxisDown!]

Disagree. There is no reason to have any discussion beyond only the most vague of terms. In this case fear and uncertainty are your friend. I am mystified they are even giving it any discussion. For all we know this thing could grenade after a couple hard days.

Well sure. ....my preference would have been that this not have turned into a lot of publicity and Elon just stayed silent on this whole track testing anyways. Sure people at the track might have spotted it but oh well. It's not like porsche was going to crank out volume production on the Taycan at any point this year.....its not even hitting the US market until next year. Elon could've stayed silent on the Plaid version until Spring of next year easily and then brought it out to kill any Taycan hype just as porsche would be about to start actual volume production

 

[MC3OZ]

Disagree. There is no reason to have any discussion beyond only the most vague of terms. In this case fear and uncertainty are your friend. I am mystified they are even giving it any discussion. For all we know this thing could grenade after a couple hard days.

The Pickup reveal in November is a suitable time to disclose specs, prices and production timeline, if they want to..

I think they may also have a Plaid prototype Model X on display...

All this is a suitable "warm up act" for the Pickup reveal....

Otherwise if they just do a Pickup reveal, it is potentially a short event...

I'm 70% sure the Pickup reveal will say something about the Plaid power-train...

IMO the Plaid Model S is a Taycan competitor and only partially a competitor to the Raven Model S, once pricing an timelines are revealed, buyers can make a decision. Model S owners who were thinking of switching to a Taycan will wait for the Plaid Model S. Everyone else will make up their mind depending on their time-frame and budget... if a small number of buyers wait for a Plaid Model S rather than buying a Raven, that is possibly offset by better margins on the Plaid edition.

 

[Todd Burch]

It would be VERY bad for Elon to outline a price range well in advance of production.

Remember what the media did with the $35k Model 3? Don’t want to experience that again.

Tesla needs to complete initial track testing and durability testing before they can better hone in on the cost to build the car. A lot can happen in a year.

Plus, Tesla will want to gauge initial interest as well. If they announce $135k and find demand is off the hook, they missed out on charging $150k instead.

What’s certain is that this will not be a small price premium over the Raven.

My bet is it will be anywhere from $130k to $160k.

 

[MC3OZ]

It would be VERY bad for Elon to outline a price range well in advance of production.

Remember what the media did with the $35k Model 3? Don’t want to experience that again.

Tesla needs to complete initial track testing and durability testing before they can better hone in on the cost to build the car. A lot can happen in a year.

Plus, Tesla will want to gauge initial interest as well. If they announce $135k and find demand is off the hook, they missed out on charging $150k instead.

What’s certain is that this will not be a small price premium over the Raven.

My bet is it will be anywhere from $130k to $160k.

My guess is 2 versions base $120-130K, premium $140-145K.

If they don't reveal a price, they need to make it clear there is a significant price premium over the Raven, perhaps a range and a statement similar to yours is best ...."$130k to $160k." Even if I am right, your statement is a much better way of saying it, at this time,

 

[SoGA Fan Club]

How about you just chill out when you see that I'm right today. And then tell your bosses to cover

Chill dude - it was a damn joke. Why you freaking out? And who are my bosses?

 

[SoGA Fan Club]

We are green now

Space's hunches looking good in my book right now!

 

[SoGA Fan Club]

My guess is 2 versions base $120-130K, premium $140-145K.

If they don't reveal a price, they need to make it clear there is a significant price premium over the Raven, perhaps a range and a statement similar to yours is best ...."$130k to $160k." Even if I am right, your statement is a much better way of saying it, at this time,

It would definitely be smart to announce a price now - even if the actual price is lower when it goes into production. Personally, I don't see why it wouldn't start at $185k - that's what the performance (uhhhh...Turbo S) Taycan starts at, and the Plaid is CLEARLY a far superior car in every way.