Re:Elon Musk Gambled Tesla to Save SolarCity
by ghaff on Monday August 26, 2019 @07:45PM
(#20804849)
A lot of the financial innovation was about obscuring the actual costs (and potential cost/obligations) and benefits to consumers. For example, liens and potential maintenance obligations down the road. It was also driven by the tax incentives that existed for a time. I notice I don't get practically tackled by solar panel installers every time I enter Home Depot any longer.
SolarCity's innovation was the financing model. It was adopted by the rest of the solar panel industry. The problem was that they fucked up the investment side and paid for this business model with expensive debt instead of cheap capital.
They are also working on Solar Roof - another huge innovation with great potential.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2018/10/five-solar-roof-shin...
Tesla/SolarCity was never the first, or even the frontrunner, when it comes to developing solar shingles. Just the ones who spoke the loudest and retroactively declared themselves the inventors of a product they haven't yet successfully made and that has been in development by the rest of the solar panel industry for a few decades.