Tesla doesn't feel like a toy, it feels like the future. They're years ahead of everybody else in terms of tech that is usable today.
Briefly thought of BMW i3, but once I tested Model3 & played with its Autopilot on stop/go commute - Teslas are years ahead of the game. Best part is, they can only get better.
- The very thought of dealership, auto repair shops feels very old now. I had a problem with my left indicator stalk, booked an appointment in the same Tesla app, a mobile mech pulled up, took out the whole driving wheel unit and fixed it on the spot.
- They have bi-monthly, monthly updates (feels like our software dev 2 week sprints) where they release NEW features, yes, brand new features... not just bug fixes or improvements.
The Model3 body feels like a frame-housing with an ever improving hardware/software under it to constantly make it better n better.
It feels like the iPhones vs Nokia smart phones debate in 2010.
Everyone who drives a tesla knows how their car behaves. I don't expect it to see that barrier when I'm driving my model 3.
Listen - it's hard to imagine what it's actually like to drive a Tesla and learning what it can or can't do. Everyone driving a tesla right now knows that the autopilot is more like a rookie co-pilot that needs monitoring and checking all along the way. Despite its limitations its still the best car out there from what I've personally experienced.
That shows just how badly people want to do something else instead of driving though, and how important autonomous cars are. If tesla (or some other company) can get it right, this is transformative.
Pay attention to other drivers, I've seen people watch a movie on their phone while driving.
I've seen people move their hands completely off of the wheel and drive.
At least with this you usually don't go hitting other cars, rather hit barriers and walls.
I'm not defending tesla here, I'm just saying this tech is still far better than the average driver paying barely any attention to the road.
The competition was a joke for years, but eventually things normalised. Going Android is not at all the same feeling than going back to an nokia or blackberry of old.
So, who knows what current owner are going to do when every car manufacturer has a full line up of electric cars ?
Besides, when the other car manufacturers starts putting out electric cars with interiors that consists of more than a cost saving touch screen, their manufacturing and service experience will be a great benefit. Granted Tesla is pretty much the only option in their segment at the time, and have been for years. So why are they making such a big loss now, before the competition has really started?
I think Tesla was great for the car industry, and they do some things really well, but they've also made some questionable decisions. I still think betting on autonomous driving is a strange decision for a small company that have plenty of other stuff to focus on. The cars would still sell without it, let subcontractors worry about stuff like that.
[0] https://boingboing.net/2018/08/24/oh-boy-tesla-gossip.html
I do not know the actual manufacturing cost comparison between the Tesla big screen and the corresponding set of buttons and other cars, but I think the key difference is a radically minimalist design aesthetic. I suspect both a bunch of buttons or a big screen are sufficiently inexpensive.
The Tesla decision is more similar to Apple's decision, who was not saving money when they put the largest screen ever used on a cell phone, covering most of the front of the first iPhone. Even though in the long run it probably turns out that the big touchscreen is cheaper than a bunch of buttons which individually wear out and must be warrantied etc.
First is that Tesla just straight up doesn't play the traditional head unit provider game. Most OEMs go with one or two hardware suppliers (Denso, Pioneer, Kenwood, etc.) for their head units, pretty much all of which are completely and utterly behind on technology and also ridiculously overpriced for a variety of reasons. They also add expensive OS/software licenses or in-house development for, again, behind the times products to run on the head units and pair with your phone. Tesla, on the other hand, just grabs a good-enough touch screen, powers it with Nvidia hardware, and cranks out some pretty software built on top of Linux that mostly works.
Second is labor cost. Instrument cluster hardware isn't free, but it also isn't terribly expensive for your standard gauges in mass-manufacturing bulk. However, labor is not cheap to actually wire up, place, and test all those gauges. Wiring is one of those things that's hard to automate, so your costs between the hardware and labor boost the BOM cost up quite a bit. Tesla, on the other hand, just runs a single CAN bus connector to their center console display hardware, pulls the info they need to update it, and calls it a day.
The net result is that the total production cost of a single center screen ends up being quite a bit lower than the equivalent head unit + instrument cluster in a traditional car.
FWIW I think they should be way more conservative with how they advertise Autopilot, but the only way something like that is getting shipped at this stage is from in-house.
Bosch have their own autonomous driving development. I don't know how far along they are compared to Tesla, partly because Elon likes to boast where others prefer to hold back, but so what if Tesla would've been a few years later with self driving than others?
https://www.bosch-mobility-solutions.com/en/highlights/autom...
Yeah, but how expensive is that team?
Considering that
1) it gets some good PR (although other manufacturers are slowly starting to catch up with their own lane assistance + lane departure + adaptive cruise control features)
2) that PR effect probably generates a good influx of resumes from software engineers well-versed in AI, hardware, data science, etc.
3) those engineers can then be assigned to work on other software features, as shifting priorities demand
If you fired everybody on Autopilot team, you'd probably need to spend most of that saved cash on recruiting funnel.
Tesla already feels at least three years ahead of other manufacturers, and the cars other manufacturers are promising in the next few years are aiming to possibly compete with what Tesla's been selling for at least a year.
The Model S is being sold today with 370 miles of range, Autopilot, and the Supercharger network. Where will Tesla be in a few years if/when other manufacturers catch up with that?
>Where will Tesla be in a few years if/when other manufacturers catch up with that?
wouldnt that be highly dependent on teslas cash burn and desperate cash grabs to survive the next quarter?
in a few years you should hope to still retain some form of autopilot, maybe the supercharger network is shared/sold off,
370 miles of range? battery tech isnt improving so much but usually battery life drops
Tests have shown that is not really that big of a factor.
E.g. https://cleantechnica.com/2019/01/28/350000-miles-in-a-tesla...
https://electrek.co/2017/09/04/how-tesla-model-s-holds-up-ti...
https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1120820597347377152 >@FredericLambert Also, how did you manage to get shamed into being de facto anti-Tesla by social media trolls. Jeez …
but.. im sure the numbers are thoroughly researched...
The Tesla model S 100D I bought in December 2017 now has over 17,000 miles on it, with 95% of those miles fast supercharged.
My max range has declined 2 miles. That's well under 1%, which is especially impressive given that most battery capability loss happens in the beginning of it's lifespan.
How? Well, I suppose the battery management software and hardware is as advanced as is claimed.
Selling the supercharger network to a separate company, and enabling it to serve all EVs, seems like an obviously great idea. Rebrand it from "Tesla Supercharger" to “Supercharger". Tesla cars can stiull be sold as compatible with “the Supercharger network”.
I'm not a financial modeling kind of person, but I suspect such a beast could sell for quite a lot of money, strengthening Tesla's finances. Perhaps one of the gigantic oil companies that owns/franchises a gigantic chain of gas stations would like to stake out a leading claim on EV charging, those folks have plenty of money.
It would also further Tesla's stated goal of accelerating the transition to EV's or whatever.
Of course there are downsides, giving up this proprietary advantage. Still, that downside versus retiring some risk seems like a nice trade-off.
yes a trustworthy company run by a well regarded ceo that could raise money
tesla? not so optimistic. until tesla finds significant backing they're just going to keep playing the desperate cash pump game
im all for it tbh, its hella funny
It's even worse here because the buying cycle for cars is longer than phones, and Tesla needs more cash right now.
Now, I'm fully convinced by Tesla in every way and am never ever going back to dealerships. The car, the service, the people, all of it is on a whole higher plane of satisfaction. It feels like the transition from a flip phone to an iPhone in 2008.
So I guess I'm one of those insane Tesla fans now :-/
It seems like the analogy is very apt.
Lots of people pointing out flaws with Tesla's cars and saying that when the incumbents make it into the market they will squash them. Same thing happened with the iPhone - it didn't have multitasking, copy/paste, mms (all things that even standard dumbphones had). Nokia, Blackberry are huge Apple has no chance.
A product can simultaneously be inferior in some (or many) aspects, but still feel somehow be on another plane of feeling like the future.
[product talk aside, Tesla's real problem seems to be execution - can they actually build the damn cars, and can they make a profit on them?]
Same here. This is how I describe it to other people.
In other words, I don’t get the whole Tesla club thing for basically a glorified metal bucket.
Although for some odd reason I do want Tesla to be my next car.
* No oil changes
* Charge at home, wake up every morning to a "full tank" for a lot less than it'd cost to fill up with gas
* No gas station fill-ups
* Autopilot is huge for quality of life on highways and in bumper-to-bumper traffic
* I keep the valet key card in my wallet, but there's no physical key that you need to keep with you. My car key was the last one I really needed, so I no longer carry physical keys
* The car has an API, so you can use it to automate various actions (like to start the HVAC system if the car is at work and it's 4:30pm on a weekday). With my normal schedule, the car is already pre-warmed/cooled any time I get in it
* Built-in dashcam includes side cameras, and sentry mode
* Summon, and (soon) enhanced summon
None of that helps if you're driving a loaner while you're waiting for parts, but it's tough to quantitatively measure the impact of just having things like this. And I've got more faith in Tesla to improve logistics in parts sourcing than traditional automakers becoming more like Tesla.
This is the way Tesla wants it.
In a car dealership world, you're sold a future revenue generator for the dealer, as you're expected to come for routine maintenance.
With Tesla's corporate ownership and generous warranty, the less they see of you (post-purchase), the better it will be for the bottom line.
I suppose any auto manufacturer selling their vehicles direct and owning their service centers outright would have a strong incentive to maintain high reliability, and yet for some reason Tesla remains the only one pursuing that model.
I still never want to see service people, or deal with service, and definitely never want to interact with a sales person ever again. Tesla is the best at making that happen. And that A to B is more enjoyable too. It really sounds like you'd be very happy if you bought a Tesla, assuming it's in the budget.
I wonder if Tesla should not have entered the mass market with the 3 and stuck with the S and X. Higher margins and lower CapEx there.
In 2013 Tesla won (by a wide margin) the Consumer Reports rating for the best infotainment system. It turned out that a lot of owners loved large, fast, responsive touch screens for viewing maps, navigation, controlling multimedia and vehicle settings.
You'd think that everybody in the car business would be elbowing one another to introduce a better, brighter, faster, more colorful and capable infotainment system, given a clear product market fit.
Yet the winner for that Consumer Reports award did not change in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 or 2018.
It’s insane how archaic it feels after getting used to a Tesla. Now, an odyssey isn’t a luxury vehicle or anything, but it is the top of the line car from Honda and it really just feels like hot trash now..
What you get for your money:
20k-40k: Plastic
40k-75k: Plastic painted to look like metal and wood veneers
75k+: Maybe metal and real wood
This refers to everything you touch and see in and outside the car.
US manufactures aren’t in the 75K+ market for sedans, US mfgs only know plastic.
For the Germans, you need to be in flagship cars to get away from metalized plastic (A7/A8, S-class, 7-series). Porsche is a safe bet for real materials.
Tesla replaced everything inside the car with a giant, great looking screen. 90% of the “value engineering” by which existing car makers use to differentiate between their Low and high end cars... Tesla just got rid of it. Tesla has no intention on playing in the “value engineering” traditional mfgs have been doing for decades (it was the only innovation game left to play).
Tesla instead is competing with tech and features they can literally upload to your car overnight. There is no comparison to traditional autos.
Tesla is an iPhone moment for car industry (if they can manage to deliver the quality and experience they promise without going out of business).
I used to drive a more expensive BMW than the Model 3 I have now. To say that the Model 3 is the toy, it’s absurd at best. It is so much better in terms of technology, handling, efficiency, maintenance, cost of ownership, performance, etc. that it makes comments like yours really sound completely uninformed.
This is the point that so many people miss when arguing that an EV revolution is coming and others will catch Tesla. It's not that Tesla's lead is insurmountable; it's that Tesla's lead is growing, not shrinking, with each passing day.
No single feature or technology tells this story adequately but the compound effect of all of them does: it's 2019, and not a single manufacturer can produce a car that rivals a 2012 Model S.
Eventually you reach a point where everything is good enough so being better isn't much of an advantage. Like if Tesla gives you 700 mi range but Audi does 500mi, does anyone really care?
In this case, yes, because current battery tech charges much faster from 0-80% of the battery, so a battery with more range than you'll use is still beneficial because it'll charge faster for the portion you do use. But I'm being snarky--that's not your point.
Tesla's advantage is far more than just range.
* The battery management system, which minimizes battery degradation (google "nissan leaf degradation")
* The manufacturing process adopted to actual EVs (and not shoehorning an EV into an ICE car design)
* The lack of dealerships and resulting ability to push software updates to cars containing new features
* The standardization of self-driving hardware -- all Teslas made since ~2016 have the camera hardware set up in the same positions
* The actual ownership of the software / UI and it actually being done well, when most other manufacturers seem to be shooting for "passable, I guess"
* The big touchscreen UI, which is (effectively) the same across all models, which makes keeping software up-to-date much easier
It's just not even close. Other manufacturers can improve battery tech, too, but these other things require bold action that traditional manufacturers are too slow / cautious / encumbered to take.
There is/was a race between Tesla getting good at traditional car manufacturing and the legacy car makers coming up with their own EVs. It appears that Tesla is going to lose that race. Or at least not win it by enough where they will end up as one of the bigger car companies.
Traditional automakers are, indeed, much better at profitably making what consumers wanted in 2012. It's not clear how well they'll react as expectations change, driven in large part by what Tesla's shown can be done. Being a lot better at profitably making flip phones only helps while people still want flip phones. And just because everyone was using flip phones in 2006 doesn't mean they would be in 2010.
Which goes back to the initial point about there being a race on and Tesla isn't winning it. Tesla has to increase their manufacturing by an order of magnitude before the other car companies make competitive EVs. We already are seeing legacy car makers introducing EVs so the race is all but over. Tesla will survive as a niche luxury brand along the lines of a BMW, but they're not going mainstream.
Apple had successful business in related fields before starting to sell phones, and the consumer purchase cycle for phones is much faster than cars. Unless traditional automakers take note and make big structural changes, the same pattern will happen here--only more slowly.
> We already are seeing legacy car makers introducing EVs so the race is all but over.
You're missing the point if you think being a good EV is the only significant differentiator Tesla has. It's probably only 1/3 of the things I love about this car that traditional automakers will be unable to compete with easily.
Sure, given time and money any automotive manufacturer can build out their own high-speed charging network. So why haven't they?
It's like the only car that actually gives you new features after buying it. Listens to their consumers, and provides them with what they want (most of the time)
This means that those who upgrade their vehicles often will not even consider a Tesla.
In Finland, at least, they are forefeiting one of the biggest groups of luxury car buyers.
This may have significant consequences to the industry, if Tesla doesn’t fail.
Who do not pay for the lifetime externalities of each of their vehicles burning petroleum for hundreds of thousands of miles.
If you accept climate change is man made, and that combustion vehicles contribute to it, it is insane we don’t make internal combustion vehicles pay for their externalities as part of their cost to level the playing field, and force electric vehicle manufacturers to compete against them without such a handicap in place.
They need to be if you are going to use them to reward wealthy Tesla investors and vehicle buyers.
They were the first mover, and as is the case with racing, being first means others can draft and pass you.
Seems likely by the time any of the competition is shipping in reasonable numbers (already hearing complaints of limited battery supply from the German companies) there's likely to be a model S with the improve battery pack based on the same tech as the model 3.
[1] https://electrek.co/2018/09/07/bmw-i3-100-kwh-battery-pack-l...
The main problem is unlike ICE cars that generally have so much wasted energy that temperature, speed, terrain, and driving style do not have a particularly large impact on range. In comparison electric cars are so efficient that elevation changes, cold temperatures, and running the AC or heater can make big differences. In particular speed can make a huge difference. A model 3 with a 300 or so mile range can go over 600 miles when hyper miling. To help with that the community consensus is to take all range estimates with a grain of salt until you see the EPA range.
Said claimed 435 mile range was not tested by the EPA.
Keep in mind that the battery packs Audi e-tron is using is as almost the same size (95 kw vs 100 kw), but is providing radically less range (208 miles vs 370). So clearly the Tesla is crazy more efficient. Given the expense and weight of the batteries, clearly Audi would have made a more efficient car... if they could.
Once you do, you'll see the light!
Tesla isn't really competing against Ford/Chevy/Honda/Toyota. Instead they are competing against BMW/Mercedes/Porsche/Audi. By comparison Teslas seems like a toy compared to those other brands so I will gladly wait and give either Audi/BMW/Porsche my money as I know what type of support I will get from each.