I don't work in an automotive factory, but everyone I've asked about process engineering and factory tooling, has told me the opposite, that it is in fact quite expensive, both in capital and time, to retool.
>huge networks of dealers and service centers, which means that customers who value reliability and/or stress-free repairs are more likely to buy a BigCo car
It could be that I've simply had a completely different experience from you, but I've never really heard anyone I know say that the dealer experience was stress free or that the repairs made at dealers were reliable. In fact, almost everyone I know who is knowledgable about cars stays away from dealer service centers like the plague.
For some context I drive a 17 year old Civic that I mostly work on myself, although I do take it to a trustworthy independent shop for bigger repairs.
I actually think the current dealer network as well as the current private car ownership system might prove to be the biggest risks for the established players.
But it's certainly way cheaper and faster than to build a new factory like Tesla will have to do, which is what I wanted to say.
> It could be that I've simply had a completely different experience from you, but I've never really heard anyone I know say that the dealer experience was stress free or that the repairs made at dealers were reliable.
Different country maybe - I'm German. We don't have the kinds of issues the US has.
Not to pile on here, but I think this is one of the things that many Europeans underestimate with regards to Tesla in the US market. If Tesla can continue to sidestep the traditional dealer franchise network, and their lobbying efforts, while scaling, I think this could be one of their biggest advantages going against the established auto companies. Unless you've been subjected to it first hand I think it's difficult to understand just how awful the US dealer experience is. From what I've heard the transparency of the Tesla buying experience is a consistent selling point.
The problem is: a Tesla is radically different from any other car. You need specialized knowledge (especially in HV distribution) to properly repair it, and most likely also ultra-special tools, and from what I've heard (eg https://forums.tesla.com/forum/forums/replacement-parts-why-...) spare parts are extremely hard to come by, even for official Tesla shops.
So basically you need a massive network of official shops and dealers in order to assure the customers that their damaged/broken car is going to get fixed... and that's where BigCar has an advantage: all they need to do is to train one or two employees at each existing shop/dealer in how to service/repair an electric car, and they have the entire country serviced. Tesla on the other hand has to build the stores, hire and train personnel on their own... and that's a significant hit on capex.
Charging station coverage in the US is about where digital cellular coverage was in the mid-2000s. It exists in most places and in major population centers, but there are clear holes. Gas stations meanwhile are still ubiquitous.
The outlook may be different in 5-10 years, but right now in the US a plug-in hybrid is the best of both worlds IMO. Assuming your round-trip daily commute is within the electric range it's a de-facto pure EV, with the gasoline only kicking in for occasional longer trips.
Even this may be optimistic. I can name the 5 closest gas stations to my house (even though the closest is about 8 miles away), but I couldn't name a single charging station. Not one. I see Teslas on the road, so they must exist, but I haven't a clue where they are.
And Tesla's supercharger map: https://www.tesla.com/supercharger
I've found they tend to be out of the way or attached to shopping centers/big box stores/other places you wouldn't expect. It's rare to find a charging station with gas-station-like visibility, the numbers just aren't there yet I guess.
Indeed, it's much more complex than an EV. Yet as of February 2017 Toyota alone had delivered ten million hybrid vehicles, with 80,000 mile drive train warranties - better than Tesla offer and on a scale magnitudes greater.
Toyota has the Prius, which is the car model that basically equaled "electric car" before Tesla even though it's "just" a hybrid. I wouldn't put Toyota out of the game yet.
> Both the Asian, European and American competitors will not only be 3-4 or even 5-6-7 years behind.
Where they will be in front of Tesla, however, and that for at least a decade: scaling and support. Once a car manufacturer figures out how to build a decent electric vehicle, it's easy to retool the factories. BMW with its i3/i8 series has experience with electric cars and with scaling while maintaining quality. Also, the big manufacturers have huge networks of dealers and service centers, which means that customers who value reliability and/or stress-free repairs are more likely to buy a BigCo car instead of a Tesla.
> They will be hundreds of millions of miles behind in terms of autonomy, and thousands of charging stations behind.
In Europe, charging station connectors should be standardized so there won't be a major advantage there. And autonomy... I would be surprised if big truck/bus vendors like MAN, Scania, Volvo and others don't have their newest fleet models send telemetry data back to home like Tesla does. Especially buses can deliver mountains of data about city travel back home.
tl; dr: I would not count on BigCar going belly-up, Tesla will imho just be a powerful competition but nothing like BigCar in scale.