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

[Stars aligned]

If Porsche are smart they will Osborne their ICE vehicles as quickly as possible while VW is still sloshing R&D euros around. It will be much harder to do so once sales start declining.

Volkswagen AG as a whole has huge issues as they do not have secured the supply chain, and even more importantly, don't have the technology. In terms of technology, battery and software are the most important ones. On both, VW group is nowhere. VW's hyped chassis (MEB) is last century and they missed to catch up on battery, software and battery supply chain.

The sad thing for Porsche is that they merged with VW. If they had not, they would have much more freedom without all the ballast from Volkswagen group, and they could act without all the overhead. I always liked to drive Porsche's, but since the merger it turned to the worse. The only recent highlight was the 718 boxster, a nice basic, pure, relatively light weighted and well handling sports car. Would make a very nice EV and I'm thinking how to make mine electric. But I hate those over engineered 911's of the latest generation, the Panameras and SUV's. In my eyes, they ridicule the roots of the company and make me to run away. I test drove all of them, and I find them awful.

As much as I like Tesla and my Model S I want to have some options. A standalone Porsche, freed of the VW group burden and humiliated, would be excellent. Also it would be much easier for them to secure raw materials. I very much avoid any of VW's products as they lied too much, although I see Diess as honest. Diess leading Porsche would be excellent, if VW and Audi go to hell I wouldn't care. Skoda engineers might be a good fit for Tesla Europe.

 

[jerry33]

The real opening is on the low end. There are millions of potential customers on the low end that are unlikely to see a Tesla product in the near future. Low end market sales are the low hanging fruit.

If these automakers want to thrive then they will need to develop products for markets where they won’t have Tesla as a competitor for a few years.

While it's true that Tesla won't have a low end car for a few years, it's also true that there is very little profit margin at the low end.

 

[jerry33]

• Earth Moving...

Earthmovers use electric motors, at least for the larger equipment. What they don't use is batteries to power the electric motors. The reason for electric motors is that when you are talking 100,000+ kg of payload, transmissions just don't work, so electric motors are use.

 

[Fact Checking]

The sad thing for Porsche is that they merged with VW. If they had not, they would have much more freedom without all the ballast from Volkswagen group, and they could act without all the overhead. I always liked to drive Porsche's, but since the merger it turned to the worse.

The people who controlled Porsche before the takeover-merger had no choice in the matter: they tried to take over Volkswagen, but that attempt failed and the people controlling Volkswagen ended up controlling Porsche too instead, and the pre-takeover Porsche executives left.

The maze of actual corporate ownership is rather confusing, with an entity named "Porsche SE" technically owning VW Group - but the actual power relationship is clear-cut: today the CEO of Porsche AG (Oliver Blume) is reporting to the CEO of the VW Group (Herbert Diess).

 

[Right_Said_Fred]

It's so funny to see how the sceptics and haters underestimate Tesla and Elon.

- Haha, no time slots reserved this year, better luck next year. One week later: three time slots reserved. Eat crow.
- Haha, Nico Rosberg isn't even licensed to drive the Nurburgring. One week later: three professional racing drivers with outstanding knowledge of the Nurburgring are driving the Plaids. Eat crow.
- Haha, this was just an ill-prepared last-minute idea by Elon after Porsche presented the Taycan. One week later: the Plaid has been under development for months, if not longer, one already lapped a record time at Laguna Seca and two more were airlifted to Germany together with a team of professionals. Eat crow.

They've now lost one of their favourite talking points: a Model S can't even drive a lap around the Nurburgring, because overheating. Worse: the Model S does it much faster than the Taycan.

They are now trying to find every possible excuse they can to belittle the 20 second (so far) time gap:

- No production car (neither was the Taycan, both were prototypes)
- No standard tires (neither on the Taycan)
- Stripped car (so was the Taycan)
- Not the top of the line Taycan (if true: the Turbo is heavier, so may not even be faster)
- Porsche didn't go flat out to not embarass its current ICE lineup (show us then).

Only fools underestimate Elon.

 

[lascavarian]

So in my view Musk is saying: ICE's are obsolete, you HAVE to enter the BEV market as soon as possible....but Tesla will always stay ahead.

Agreed on entering the market as soon as possible.

The faulty reasoning the plaid drive unit is quelling is that all I have to do is just a low volume high end hybrid or a high end LOW volume performance product. EM is saying that that that path is closed. Five years ago, then it was a valid path but now the only path open is really the low end or fail. Tesla will crush (price & performance) any attempt to just do high end products.

This means heavy investment in battery production immediately. The path is open and waiting.

 

[lascavarian]

Once the Pickup, Semi, Roadster and Model Y are in production, the only significant market segments left untapped are:-

• Vans
• Compact low priced models.
• Mini-buses
• Buses
• Farm Machinery
• Earth Moving...
• Other specialist vehicles

I don't really see anything stopping Tesla eventually moving into these segments.

This is it. Tesla has closed off several possible paths/segments that auto makers could have taken. Time has now past and Tesla has a firm beachhead/lead in manufacturing, energy storage (battery packs), traction motors, safety and autonomy particularly where market volume is low (tens or hundreds of thousands).

If you are a high volume vehicle producer (millions), then fewer and fewer paths are available. The plaid drive unit establishes an elevated risk of failure for limited production premium vehicles. It is increasingly obvious that the path most open is on the high volume, lower end vehicles.

Commodity high volume BEVs are where the opportunity is for those manufacturing in the millions. They have the support infrastructure in place, they bend metal just fine; they just need to secure batteries and buy up some SW. The recent battery tech is pretty good and in a year they could be well situated with a high volume low end BEV in a market where there is no Tesla to compete with.

Plaid technology should make that an easier and easier decision.

 

[Pras]

It's so funny to see how the sceptics and haters underestimate Tesla and Elon.

- Haha, no time slots reserved this year, better luck next year. One week later: three time slots reserved. Eat crow.
- Haha, Nico Rosberg isn't even licensed to drive the Nurburgring. One week later: three professional racing drivers with outstanding knowledge of the Nurburgring are driving the Plaids. Eat crow.
- Haha, this was just an ill-prepared last-minute idea by Elon after Porsche presented the Taycan. One week later: the Plaid has been under development for months, if not longer, one already lapped a record time at Laguna Seca and two more were airlifted to Germany together with a team of professionals. Eat crow.

They've now lost one of their favourite talking points: a Model S can't even drive a lap around the Nurburgring, because overheating. Worse: the Model S does it much faster than the Taycan.

They are now trying to find every possible excuse they can to belittle the 20 second (so far) time gap:

- No production car (neither was the Taycan, both were prototypes)
- No standard tires (neither on the Taycan)
- Stripped car (so was the Taycan)
- Not the top of the line Taycan (if true: the Turbo is heavier, so may not even be faster)
- Porsche didn't go flat out to not embarass its current ICE lineup (show us then).

Only fools underestimate Elon.

I hope that plaid S comes with broad set of racing options incl.

• usuals like Racing seats, tires/wheels, carbon brakes, etc.
• Modified aero (spoiler, etc)
• Track set up (track maps, set-up car for particular track condition e.g. dry vs wet, Monza vs Monaco),
• Telemetry or at least lap data recorder
• Camera recorder

The last three will mostly just need software updates.

 

[ReflexFunds]

This is it. Tesla has closed off several possible paths/segments that auto makers could have taken. Time has now past and Tesla has a firm beachhead/lead in manufacturing, energy storage (battery packs), traction motors, safety and autonomy particularly where market volume is low (tens or hundreds of thousands).

If you are a high volume vehicle producer (millions), then fewer and fewer paths are available. The plaid drive unit establishes an elevated risk of failure for limited production premium vehicles. It is increasingly obvious that the path most open is on the high volume, lower end vehicles.

Commodity high volume BEVs are where the opportunity is for those manufacturing in the millions. They have the support infrastructure in place, they bend metal just fine; they just need to secure batteries and buy up some SW. The recent battery tech is pretty good and in a year they could be well situated with a high volume low end BEV in a market where there is no Tesla to compete with.

Plaid technology should make that an easier and easier decision.

ICE OEMs cannot do this, they cannot even make a positive gross margin on premium EVs.
They are far far from achieving the powertrain efficiency and battery pack costs needed to launch profitable lower end vehicles. I don't think they are even on the right path to doing this, first they need to completely change their strategy and culture towards vertical integration (both manufacturing and sales), rapid iteration, software and fleet learning.

 

[lascavarian]

High end is right. There are still plenty of people who want the old fashioned "luxury" interior that Tesla doesn't provide. A decent ev drivetrain with that sort of interior should sell well even if the performance is worse.

If you are a smart young engineer are you excited by the opportunity of spending your career designing old fashioned luxury interiors on vehicles with so-so performance?

My point is that spending your capital on this path has little future. Some but not much.

 

[lascavarian]

ICE OEMs cannot do this, they cannot even make a positive gross margin on premium EVs.
They are far far from achieving the powertrain efficiency and battery pack costs needed to launch profitable lower end vehicles. I don't think they are even on the right path to doing this, first they need to completely change their strategy and culture towards vertical integration (both manufacturing and sales), rapid iteration, software and fleet learning.

Agreed. This is really and increasingly obvious existential decision for them. There is a path open to them that gives them some time but they have to make that decision. They cannot compete with Tesla.

 

[humbaba]

Agreed. This is really and increasingly obvious existential decision for them. There is a path open to them that gives them some time but they have to make that decision. They cannot compete with Tesla.

[edit: sorry, @lascavarian -- my post was really a response to the thread, not yours and you do allow a possibility for competing. For that I would say I think Porsche is still on the right track. I'm in the camp that the low end is closed until they attain competency.]

While I generally agree, I think there is some possibility to compete. The Taycan really has been the best effort IMO and the efforts have been getting better. True, Tesla keeps moving the goal posts so the Taycan doesn't compete as well as Porsche had assumed it would -- but it is a high performance EV with Porsche branding.

It does seem implausible that their next iteration will be any more of a Tesla killer, but if their ICE sales stay high for another five years they could plausibly introduce a new model by then that would be an improvement. Yes, this risks all the money spent on developing the Taycan and, yes, the Taycan isn't expected to pay off until something like 2023 -- but while not being profitable is a drag the closer it gets to break even the better off Porsche will be.

Put another way, Porsche learned a lot from designing the Taycan so I think it obvious that equal R&D will produce a vehicle that will at least be superior to the Taycan. And if it is a different form (e.g., SUV/CUV) then it will have less impact on the Taycan sales while providing a quicker road to profitability.

In short, I don't think Porsche is done even if they never actually make a Tesla killer because I don't think they need to. As long as what they make is in the ballpark it will sell -- and until the market is saturated with EVs I expect that they will sell anyway.

All of which is a good thing: there's too much needed vehicle production for Tesla to do it alone (and I'm one of those that thinks it will be a sad future if every vehicle is a Tesla, I like me some variety). It does need to be in greater volume than Porsche was planning for the Taycan, but at least it is a step forward.

 

[Artful Dodger]

They've now lost one of their favourite talking points: a Model S can't even drive a lap around the Nurburgring, because overheating. Worse: the Model S does it much faster than the Taycan. EAT CROW.

FTFY.

 

[Singuy]

That is only one metric we know of.

"The Best" usually has a price premium.

Buying "The Best" is not necessarily pissing money away.

Chasing the best already put the object above the concern for money. And the Best usually has a time stamp. Everything is the best at X time..and then something supercede it at a different time. So if you are that concerned about having the best, then you wouldn't care if something better comes out next week because you'll buy that too.

This is why chasing the best and being money conscious are polar opposite.

 

[KarenRei]

TSLAQ harassing French regulators to try to weaponise them against Tesla re: Autopilot.

Model_Q on Twitter

Any French people here want to counter?

 

[kbM3]

I'd be perfectly happy with Tesla meeting its self-imposed deadline of the first Model Y deliveries in late 2020.

From Q4 update letter:
“Additionally, this year we will start tooling for Model Y to achieve volume production by the end of 2020, most likely at Gigafactory 1. All of these activities are setting us up for very significant annual growth in 2019.”

Why wouldn’t this indicate production start in 2020 H1?

 

[Zaxxon]

In short, I don't think Porsche is done even if they never actually make a Tesla killer because I don't think they need to. As long as what they make is in the ballpark it will sell -- and until the market is saturated with EVs I expect that they will sell anyway.

Of course they're not done in that scenario. There's no need for anyone to make a Tesla killer--the situation reminds me of the old saying: "You don't need to outrun the bear. You just need to outrun at least one of your friends." Tesla's not going to be able to supply every vehicle in the market. Ever. So any particular manufacturer doesn't have to top Tesla--it just needs to top enough of the other remaining manufacturers so that when the dominoes start to fall, it remains standing.

 

[Singuy]

Of course they're not done in that scenario. There's no need for anyone to make a Tesla killer--the situation reminds me of the old saying: "You don't need to outrun the bear. You just need to outrun at least one of your friends." Tesla's not going to be able to supply every vehicle in the market. Ever. So any particular manufacturer doesn't have to top Tesla--it just needs to top enough of the other remaining manufacturers so that when the dominoes start to fall, it remains standing.

There is a need to make a Tesla Killer. MSM has been hoping for one for a decade now. It's not for competitive reasons, but to simply kill Tesla so everyone can go back to their regular scheduled programming.

 

[Tslynk67]

TSLAQ harassing French regulators to try to weaponise them against Tesla re: Autopilot.

Model_Q on Twitter

Any French people here want to counter?

This one hasn't implemented the TSLAQ blacklist yet, so one can go and freely browse the nonsense, bile and general hatred of all things Elon-related.

These people a psychotic, there's a link at the top of the page to a Google spreadsheet with an inventory of all Tesla-related deaths, ever: TeslaDeaths.com: Digital record of Tesla crashes resulting in death

Seriously ******-up...

 

[shootformoon]

Ford didn't go bankrupt because they raised $36B just before the financial crisis, including mortgaging their blue oval logo.

It was thought bankrolling Chrysler and GM at the expense of Ford was rewarding poor behavior.

So Ford got the $6B to finance "green car technologies" to level the playing field in Detroit.

How about in the next bail out of detroit big three, tesla got $XB to finance Mars car technologies?