This.
I never understood why car manufacturers all make such weird wacky electric cars. When the Model S came out it was such a relief that finally there was a _normal_ looking electric car.
What I want is an electric 5-series, not the wacky i3. Don't change the appearance, just the drive train.
It turns out there's a very good reason to do that: these early models appeal to early adopters. The range kinda sucked. And yet I was happy to be an early adopter because of my nerdiness—and the financial incentives made it hard to refuse. But it definitely required planing insofar as range was concerned. At the same time, knowing that I'm putting up with these inconveniences for benefit of having some new early tech that few others have... that was worth it to me. It was also worth it to some of my friends but definitely not to most of them, who wanted first and foremost a car that didn't come with a peculiar usage pattern.
Now the 2019 Nissan Leaf has twice the range as those older models, it looks "normal", doesn't require much forethought in terms of destination distances, and is marketed to a broader audience. At the same time, the tax incentives have almost all disappeared (the $5k Georgia one is gone) and that is the normal course of action because these cars don't carry the inconvenience that they used to.
Other makers are trying to make cars to compete with Tesla, without competing with their own non-electric cars.
Currently, it is probably impossible to achieve a good profit margin on a mass-market electric car. Battery costs are too high this early in the manufacturing process. Tesla is willing to operate at the bare edge of fiscal viability while they scale… maybe even below viability. Other makers would have to take a gigantic drop in profit to compete with that.
Tesla operates at no profit, but not because they couldn't with the hardware, but rather because they still need to scale. The old manufacturers wouldn't even need to do much of that.
Let’s get some more variety.
Other automakers have to play by more sane financial rules.
Whereas Tesla does indeed have some systemic financial issues.
In other words Amazon could have been "profitable" on a GAAP accounting basis fairly early on, but Tesla would struggle to do that.
There are more people wanting to buy Tesla's than they can currently produce[1].
Telsa needs to spend more money to increase production. They make money on each car sold and they can sell a lot more than they currently do. Tesla being in the red in order to increase production is the same scenario that Amazon was in.
[0] https://www.fool.com/investing/2019/07/26/tesla-management-t...
[1] https://electrek.co/2018/07/03/tesla-model-3-long-backlog-re...
Tesla annual net income, in millions:
Year 1: -$78
Year 2: -$82
Year 3: -$56
Year 4: -$154
Year 5: -$254
Year 6: -$396
Year 7: -$74
Year 8: -$294
Year 9: -$889
Year 10: -$675
Year 11: -$1,961
Year 12: -$976
Q1+Q2 Year 13: -$1110
Amazon annual net income, in millions (rounded):
Year 1: $0
Year 2: -$100
Year 3: -$700
Year 4: -$1400
Year 5: -$600
Year 6: -$100
Year 7: $0
Year 8: $600
Year 9: $400
Year 10: $200
Year 11: $500
Year 12: $600
Year 13: $900
I don’t think that’s something that could be said about Amazon.
BMW electric Mini is due to go on the market in spring 2020 - they’re manufacturing them now in Oxford. I guess that counts as a 'real electric car'. Whether it’s a great one remains to be seen.
Range is not as great as the 3 (150 vs 210 miles IIRC?) but it’s a smaller car, so doesn’t have as much room for batteries as the 3 or S do.
That’s why I compared the Mini with the range of the ordinary Model 3 & not the LR version. The price difference between the stock models is wide enough already - it seems completely unreasonable to compare a £25k electric vehicle with a £45k one!
Normal European city driving then.
The Model 3 is basically an upscale take on a page out of the FCA playbook. It's a straight line rocket with a middle of the road interior crowned by a massive touchscreen.
Don't get me wrong, there's definitively something to be said for that but Tesla does not make good all around vehicles.
Tesla make vehicles that excel at a few things and are mediocre in most other regards. If they were great all around vehicles upper class suburbanites would be buying them as general daily drivers instead of task specific cars (commuting in this case), a market segment currently filled by the station wagon/crossover/small suv spectrum. For reasons that are outside the scope of this comment, I think Tesla is wise to build sedans for upscale buyers rather than enter the crossover and compact car free-for all.
As an owner of a Model 3, I will say that it isn't just a really great car, it's the best car I've ever owned or driven. There are SO MANY different elements of the car-owning experience Tesla redesigned to make dramatically better for the user, not to mention the incredible performance of the car.
For example it was recently reported that the Jaguar I-pace requires that you drive 17 MPH with the climate control off to achieve the manufacture specified range per charge. [0] They have 6 months worth of unsold inventory sitting on dealer lots in the US.
Tesla's strength is in getting market share from buyers who first and foremost want a great car. Everyone else is targeting suckers willing to make decisions contrary to their economic interest to show they care about the environment.
[0] https://cleantechnica.com/2019/08/13/jaguar-i-pace-sales-hav...