TSLA Market Action: 2018 Investor Roundtable

[Starno]

Full-size pickups are extremely popular in the U.S. (and some other parts of the world). They are also extremely inefficient, with an out-sized contribution to climate change.

IMO, Tesla's goal should be to dominate this market, like it has with Model S and Model 3. It is extremely important to its mission of accelerating the advent of sustainable energy, and would obviously be good for shareholders. It also should be achievable.

The real "hard-core smackdown to ICE" would not be just developing a killer halo car like the Roadster, but taking a big chunk of the market in the most heavily polluting segments, starting with the pickup.

Would be cool if they make a TRUE pickup that can go EVERYWHERE. With software in it that analyze the field and adopt the best path etc.

 

[dc_h]

Elon did a great job answering the questions. I was disappointed by her being very poorly informed and repeating the narrative again. She put him into dangerous terrain and asked him to walk around so it was not easy. Very pleased how he managed doing that and placed all the right and good hints we are looking for.

Really worth listening to and with some good new additional information.

Also I liked to hear and see him more relaxed, focussed and concentrated to the mission. The extensive stress phase of make or brake in September is over and I like him to be around a little bid longer and not burning the candle from both sides.....

I disagree a bit. I think she addressed the negative press narrative and let Elon address it from his perspective. Flipping that narrative is key to increasing the EV consumer market and the TSLA market.
I’ll listen again over the weekend, but I thought it was great.

 

[Snapdragon III]

The more I think about the cyber punk truck the more excited I get. After seeing the Semi design I trust Tesla to come up with something cool looking and desirable. And I am thrilled that they are not copying pickup truck designs from 60 years ago, like every other truck on the market. This reminds me of American car companies of the 1950's building cars with radically new and innovative design, full of the optimism and excitement about the future, and the coming space age. There was a time many decades ago when Chevy and Ford were innovative companies pushing the boundaries of technology and design, and I am glad to hear that Tesla is going to do it now, and not fall in line with the same old boring truck design that was new and innovative 60 years ago.

 

[Starno]

I disagree a bit. I think she addressed the negative press narrative and let Elon address it from his perspective. Flipping that narrative is key to increasing the EV consumer market and the TSLA market.
I’ll listen again over the weekend, but I thought it was great.

Yes, that's also the way she does her interview. She's treating the others the same way.

 

[Oil4AsphaultOnly]

Wasted opportunity to make a product that could be a huge seller. Guess it's up to that bollinger guy to make an electric truck that will compete with the real truck market. Shame. Also boosts FUD ammo when they get to blast elon's movie-prop truck that no one wants.

Listen to the podcast. He actually mumbled that they would design a more normal truck in the next iteration if his version doesn't do well. That tells us that the truck isn't a break-the-company product (which we already know), and that he's just being himself by out-innovating the competition in the truck market, not by electrifying a truck (which anyone else can do).

The negative take about it is that it'll be another model X situation (polarizing). Maybe this is deliberate? It'll give Ford a chance to bet the whole company on a traditional F-truck, but with an electric power-train; which in the scheme of the mission statement is Tesla's desired outcome (getting everyone to go electric).

 

[CaliBear1]

Really! I’ve long left this board and you’re still invoking my name. Seems a bit pathetic. If I were not super nice I would have said
get a life, pal!

You can go now TT007. We have SpaceCash now. KAPOW!

Honestly, I miss your presence here. Stop by once in awhile (an advice!). You're polarizing, but you are a legend in these here parts.

 

[CorneliusXX]

To Mr Musk:

For quite a few years now, I have been sitting with my typing-fingers firmly locked, not commenting publicly about the long hours other pickup trucks users and I have spent arguing about the drawbacks of the many erstwhile very popular vehicles currently on the market, and detailing the vast improvements possible were a non-legacy manufacturer to create one using an EV platform. These improvements encompass but are not limited to suspension, handling, capacity, flexibility of platform use, efficiency and longevity.

We unanimously and with not even a shred of doubt believe a well-designed, appealing, durable and truly functional electric pickup would so overwhelmingly capture that sector of the North American, Australian and parts of the Latin American, African, Asian and European markets that it would firmly cement the fortunes of its manufacturer, enabling it ever thereafter to enter any other manufacturing endeavors as an incontrovertibly colossal presence.

We also well understood the tenuousness of Tesla's early years, and the appropriateness of bringing to market other vehicles first, and patiently have been experiencing - either vicariously as genuinely disinterested observers or absolutely for those of us with significant amounts of our wealth tied up in Tesla stock - those years.

With that, it was with the utmost shock - sand poured into our stators - to learn you recently said

"You know, I actually don’t know if a lot of people will buy this pickup truck or not, but I don’t care."

A lot of us, sir, DO care, and we have entrusted you to guide through design and production one that will meet and exceed the exigencies of the market. We care as truck users, we care as investors, and we care as shepherds of the earth. Please assure us your extemporaneous comment occurred as the result of a poorly-reflected quip rather than as a representation of your role as Chief Product Architect.

Thank you.

Great letter.

Just one consideration. Outside the US a hilux sized vehicle is preferable. It appears that the US likes F150s or larger. Tesla would need at least two size variants to capture global ute sales.

 

[SW2Fiddler]

Yes, that's also the way she does her interview. She's treating the others the same way.

Which is fine.

She’s getting critiqued on that rapid-fire style, not only here but also on the spot by Elon if you listen to it.

Which is fine.

For a podcast, where listeners can replay and think about the content and absorb and re-listen, it’s not the worst way to go. I’m a reader, and a child of the broadcast era, and ...“not a fan” as the kids so love to passive-aggressively say.

 

[bdy0627]

Autopilot V9 anomalies - this is funny:

Trobbu | Thomas on Twitter

 

[mrdoubleb]

I read the first several pages. Here's a key paragraph from it:

"In May 2017, when Defendants stated that the Company was “on track” to meet its mass production goal, as production on a fully automated production line was supposed to be ready to begin, and in August 2017, when production on a fully automated production line was supposed to have already begun a month earlier and Model 3s were supposed to be coming off the line, according to a number of former employees the Company had not yet finished building its automated production lines in either Fremont or Nevada. Tesla was neither ramping up mass production, nor “on track” to mass produce Model 3s at any time on or around the end of 2017. 15. In fact, all of Defendants’ statements regarding progress that the Company had achieved in both Fremont and at the Gigafactory, and the statements they based on these affirmative declarations of actual progress in Model 3 mass production, were false."

IMO, there are some stretch arguments made by the attorneys. However, it does seem at least possible they can prove that Elon and management were not truthful in May and August 2017 when they stated that Tesla was "on track" for mass producing the model 3 by the end of 2017. The lines had not been installed when they were supposed to be, and were not up and running even by July. They appeared to be well behind schedule and did not appear to be "on track." It seems to me it was quite a stretch for Elon to say that they were in fact "on track" at those points. IMO, that was misleading for investors. Of course, he may have felt that they still had a slight chance of getting things rolling by the end of 2017, even if that wasn't actually possible, as is obvious in hindsight.

I'm not a lawyer and I don't know how difficult it will be to prove those charges or what that would mean if they were able to prove those things. I do know that I felt confused during that period. Elon was very clear about being in production hell, but that's also different than being behind with installing manufacturing equipment. In hindsight, knowing what we know, Elon could have been more transparent about being behind schedule, rather than continuing to confirm guidance of 5,000 model 3 by the end of 2017. I'm also not a manufacturing expert, so I don't know when it becomes obvious that a stated goal is totally unrealistic. It seems that's an important consideration. Given the weight of the entities seriously investigating this stuff, as well as the lawsuits, I think it's a mistake not to assign some significant risk to this. I don't know what the risk is, but it's not zero. If the SEC or DOJ do initiate lawsuits over it, the SP will suffer greatly.

As far as I recall, musk has said several times during warning calls, that it is difficult to predict the ramp as due to the high level of automation, once they fix a roadblock, the numbers can jump.

I would imagine he was convinced they would fix something e.g. with the module assembly robots and the numbers would jump from zero to a few thousand.

I am sure they can also present their automation plans at the time and why they though they could fix those issues and than ramp quickly.

 

[AudubonB]

Great letter.

Just one consideration. Outside the US a hilux sized vehicle is preferable. It appears that the US likes F150s or larger. Tesla would need at least two size variants to capture global ute sales.

Unfortunately, not only do I agree with you, but worse, I have become absolutely enamored of the utility of our Mercedes Sprinter van. Which, in typical Audie AND Alaskan style, is the mega-massive long (170" / 432cm wheelbase), high-top (6'3" / 191cm interior headroom from front to back) version:

But you should have seen the furniture-haul we did with it the other day! Completely enclosed; no exposure to the elements. Off to the restorers. In fact, here's a pic (perspective: that sofa in the back is far longer than the one in front and to the right):

 

[bhtooefr]

Note that Musk did already say that a van variant of the pickup platform is possible...

Myself, I find the possibility of a van variant the most compelling - right now camping is all done in very carbon-intensive ways (between camping vehicles getting appalling fuel efficiency, and the reliance on propane for heating, cooking, and sometimes even refrigeration), and a good BEV van platform could greatly improve this, at least for the Class B market.

 

[ZsoZso]

Autopilot V9 anomalies - this is funny:

Trobbu | Thomas on Twitter

Its actually pretty common, you can see variants of that every time you stop at a busy intersection red light on 3-lane road. I've seen trucks split and merge, also trucks appearing to jump on my car then slide off etc. The side and rear camera recognition is very far from accurate:

1. The type of vehicle is very often mis-recognized (truck vs SUV vs sedan)
2. The position of vehicles is always judged very poorly, they often drawn to drift over the lane lines when in reality they stay in their lane properly, sometimes they are drawn to drift into colliding position with your own car, often shown to collide with other cars
3. Even the existence of vehicles in a certain direction cannot be trusted. I have seen cases where a minivan (so not s small car) was shown approaching from behind on the next lane, but then disappeared when it got right beside me. On the other hand I have also seen phantom cars drawn that do not actually exists.
4. the number of vehicles cannot be trusted either, just as on the posted videos you can see 2 vehicles merge into one or one split into two from time to time.

There was a lot of praise of V9 on various threads on TMC, but what I see in terms of recognition for side and rear cameras does not impress me at all. Mind you, the front camera recognition is pretty good and driving seems to be mostly based on that, so driving performance is actually pretty solid.

 

[Thumper]

You don't need to drag around all that steel all year just to haul furniture. U-haul in town = $20/day. Even a longer haul is less than owning, insuring and gassing a monster as a regular driver. If you use the capacity regularly, that's a different story.

 

[HG Wells]

I like the line at the bottom. "Although it was in the precambrian era".
I knew it. Elon has a time machine. He's seen the past and the future and knows Tesla can become a $650 T company. Of course there will be a lot of inflation by then.

So that's who borrowed my time machine.

 

[EVNow]

In Recode podcast, I'm surprised she didn't ask Musk about the chairman. Not who it might be but what kind of a chairman he is looking for.

 

[neroden]

By issues - I meant things that people generally know, care about and politicians talk about. Afterall Trump is unlikely to write an opinion piece supporting gerrymandering. Whatever they do, it happens away from the public glare.

This is certainly a thing. When politicians do something extremely unpopular, they generally try to do it in darkness with nobody paying attention.

At this point the health care crisis in the US has made it quite impossible to oppose universal health care *silently* without anyone *noticing*.

 

[printf42]

Its actually pretty common, you can see variants of that every time you stop at a busy intersection red light on 3-lane road. I've seen trucks split and merge, also trucks appearing to jump on my car then slide off etc. The side and rear camera recognition is very far from accurate:

1. The type of vehicle is very often mis-recognized (truck vs SUV vs sedan)
2. The position of vehicles is always judged very poorly, they often drawn to drift over the lane lines when in reality they stay in their lane properly, sometimes they are drawn to drift into colliding position with your own car, often shown to collide with other cars
3. Even the existence of vehicles in a certain direction cannot be trusted. I have seen cases where a minivan (so not s small car) was shown approaching from behind on the next lane, but then disappeared when it got right beside me. On the other hand I have also seen phantom cars drawn that do not actually exists.
4. the number of vehicles cannot be trusted either, just as on the posted videos you can see 2 vehicles merge into one or one split into two from time to time.

There was a lot of praise of V9 on various threads on TMC, but what I see in terms of recognition for side and rear cameras does not impress me at all. Mind you, the front camera recognition is pretty good and driving seems to be mostly based on that, so driving performance is actually pretty solid.

Actually I feel Tesla did a honest and truthful job to remind drivers the car's camera perception is not perfect yet.
They could have average out most of the glitches at higher level, but they chose to display what the perception module saw, because the car is making decisions on top of that.
And when you see those are not perfect 100% of the time, it very effectively reminds you that you need to still pay attention, and not rely on it too much.

"It's a feature not a bug"

 

[neroden]

It's not been a very competitive market. There are few companies even capable of bidding for any given project. Relatively little is generally invested in improving tech between contracts, and once a contract is landed there's a strong disincentive to change anything while it's in progress.

After Musk announced his plans for TBC, I went and started digging through trade publications, as a sort of cross check of what he was claiming. And found that basically everything matched up with what he was stating. With regard to every aspect of tunneling, the theoretical maximum speed could be summed up as "We have no bloody idea, but we're certainly not there - nobody's really put forth the money to try to find out".

That's not that there haven't been advancements in TBMs in the past decade - there absolutely have been. But they've been slow and incremental - just your typical "some company making small changes to give them an advantage against one or two regional competitors in bidding when the next project contract comes up" scenarios. Disrupting such "slow and incremental" industries is Elon's bread and butter.

The interesting point is that the TBMs are actually the *strong* part of the industry. The bulldozers and backhoes (like the carts for removing spoil and bringing in reinforcement pieces) have had even *less* in the way of improvement. Which is why it can take as long to dig the hole for the TBM "launch point" as it does to drill the entire TBM-drilled tunnel, in some cases.

I've been wondering when Musk will notice this and revolutionize the bulldozer/backhoe hole-digging business. Extreme low-hanging fruit, IMO.

 

[Buckminster]

To Mr Musk:

For quite a few years now, I have been sitting with my typing-fingers firmly locked, not commenting publicly about the long hours other pickup trucks users and I have spent arguing about the drawbacks of the many erstwhile very popular vehicles currently on the market, and detailing the vast improvements possible were a non-legacy manufacturer to create one using an EV platform. These improvements encompass but are not limited to suspension, handling, capacity, flexibility of platform use, efficiency and longevity.

We unanimously and with not even a shred of doubt believe a well-designed, appealing, durable and truly functional electric pickup would so overwhelmingly capture that sector of the North American, Australian and parts of the Latin American, African, Asian and European markets that it would firmly cement the fortunes of its manufacturer, enabling it ever thereafter to enter any other manufacturing endeavors as an incontrovertibly colossal presence.

We also well understood the tenuousness of Tesla's early years, and the appropriateness of bringing to market other vehicles first, and patiently have been experiencing - either vicariously as genuinely disinterested observers or absolutely for those of us with significant amounts of our wealth tied up in Tesla stock - those years.

With that, it was with the utmost shock - sand poured into our stators - to learn you recently said

"You know, I actually don’t know if a lot of people will buy this pickup truck or not, but I don’t care."

A lot of us, sir, DO care, and we have entrusted you to guide through design and production one that will meet and exceed the exigencies of the market. We care as truck users, we care as investors, and we care as shepherds of the earth. Please assure us your extemporaneous comment occurred as the result of a poorly-reflected quip rather than as a representation of your role as Chief Product Architect.

Thank you.

I'm fairly sure that Elon is confident it will sell - he is just making sure that he doesn't have egg on his face - the pick-up consumer is not ready for an EV like sedans in the same way and there will be FUD regardless on range / superchargers in Alaska. If 20% of pick-up buyers are ready to choose an EV in the next 5 years and half are put off by an odd design - it's still a big market. I reckon that making it float and drive whilst in the water could compromise steer the design. I doubt they will do variants. It will be expensive but beat the F150 in all other factors regardless of the weirdness factor.