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I've already stated in another thread my general paranoid state with anything related to China stemming from years in manufacturing. Please don't be dismissive

I've already stated in another thread my general paranoid state with anything related to China stemming from years in manufacturing. Please don't be dismissive of the threat to Tesla and the industry in general. It's very real. Look, electric cars are easy to build. I feel funny saying this but, well, it isn't rocket science. The vast majority of people have no need for the gizmos a Tesla has. They need to get from point A to point B and back in comfort and with reliability. Is that difficult to achieve? Well, considering an electric car has a thousand or more less parts than an internal combustion car, probably not. Is that enough? Is the lack of an IC engine enough? No. You have to know how to design a chassis and suspension. There are plenty of people who do that for a living. No rocket science there. You have to know how to make a good electric motor and controller. There are plenty of folks who do that too. Look at the electric forklift industry. Electric motors and their controls are solved problems, from switched reluctance through PM BM to AC motors, loads of people know how to design and build them. I'd venture to say a good number of them are made in China these days. Well, how about batteries and battery chargers? Panasonic probably has that covered pretty well. They'd throw an entire engineering team at you just to sell you batteries. I mean, an electric car is an overgrown RC car. Very, very simple at the core. The complexity comes in if you want to turn it into a computer on wheels. And, I would venture to say, a lot of that is probably not that difficult these days. Load it up with ChromeOS or something like that and go. I am not diminishing the amount of work it would be to design and build a new electric car. It's monumental. All I am saying is I don't think it is as much about inventing new technology as much as money and execution in a business where most of the moving parts are well known solved problems. I think Tesla --and the world-- needs to take this very seriously. The way the Chinese piss all over intellectual property and manipulate markets is despicable.

1971genocide 11y ago
Its not despicable if you come from a country that is not in the western hemisphere. Tesla will never sell its cars - in africa. And lets not forget that america was built on blatant coping of IP from europe for over 100 years ! Paradoxically this blatant copying is actually going to lead to strong IP in china in the future. A country can go so far by copying others - they will always be behind america by 10-20 years. Anyway China is not a real threat to american interest - the american govt is.
- dogma1138 11y ago
  Tesla will release the PowerWall thing in Africa next year, South Africa might very well get Tesla cars as well but it's some what of a unique case where it comes to the rest of the continent. But anyhow no Tesla wont sell it's cars in Africa just like BMW won't sell it's cars in Africa (outside of few corrupt government officials) even their planned 30,000$ car is way too expensive for most of the world. Africa is also not a very good place to sell electric cars in it lacks the required infrastructure it has at least 3-4 more decades of development until electric cars will be viable there. Africa needs cheap, dependable preferably multi-fuel (diesel/bio-diesel) cars, it might be able to handle hybrids but even that is pushing it. China doesn't need to replicate Tesla, if they make an electric car which is just good enough it will have huge impact on the air-quality in the cities and sine China is pretty much the only country which is developing and building new nuclear power plants as well as leading the research into fusion when it will be able to make even a 1/3rd of a Tesla it should have enough emission free electricity to actual make a big difference. China is also quite good at actually completing tasks it sets it's sights on no matter the "cost" or what the market says if the Government will put electric cars by 2025 as a mandate the rest will fall in line.
  - 1971genocide 11y ago
    I agree with everything you just said - Just pointing out coping IP may be bad in the short term ( Tesla doesn't make as much money as they excepted ) - but in the long term its good for humanity.
    - rebootthesystem 11y ago
      In general terms, no, you are wrong. Why? The "R" in "R&D" is the expensive part. Very expensive. Ridiculously expensive in some segments (pharmaceuticals). Doing the "D" part once someone paid for the "R" part is easy and cheap. That's what stealing IP is about. If "R" was easy and inexpensive everyone would do it. Not so. The problem with saying "Oh, it's OK, China will make it better for humanity in the long run" is that killing-off companies that are engaged in heavy "R" creates a situation where all you have in the market is crap or you effectively freeze "R&D" for decades until the equation makes sense again or someone is stupid enough or rich enough to throw money at a problem. Patents and IP protection make a lot of sense when used for real inventions, real "improvements in the art". It is when they are used by trolls who make nothing, contribute nothing to society and get in the way of progress that patents turn evil. Stealing legitimate IP is a terrible thing. The only people who don't see it that way are those who have never devoted time, treasure and effort to find a solution for a difficult problem. That is when, in no uncertain terms, you absolutely get it. In my case, I devoted ten years in a constant effort to develop a technology. It was extremely difficult work. I funded all of it and it cost a bundle. At the end of the process anyone could have just taken the "D" part and gone with it with very little effort in relative terms. Go through something half as intensive as that and you'll understand where I and others are coming from.

1971genocide 11y ago

Its not despicable if you come from a country that is not in the western hemisphere. Tesla will never sell its cars - in africa. And lets not forget that america was built on blatant coping of IP from europe for over 100 years ! Paradoxically this blatant copying is actually going to lead to strong IP in china in the future. A country can go so far by copying others - they will always be behind america by 10-20 years. Anyway China is not a real threat to american interest - the american govt is.

dogma1138 11y ago
Tesla will release the PowerWall thing in Africa next year, South Africa might very well get Tesla cars as well but it's some what of a unique case where it comes to the rest of the continent. But anyhow no Tesla wont sell it's cars in Africa just like BMW won't sell it's cars in Africa (outside of few corrupt government officials) even their planned 30,000$ car is way too expensive for most of the world. Africa is also not a very good place to sell electric cars in it lacks the required infrastructure it has at least 3-4 more decades of development until electric cars will be viable there. Africa needs cheap, dependable preferably multi-fuel (diesel/bio-diesel) cars, it might be able to handle hybrids but even that is pushing it. China doesn't need to replicate Tesla, if they make an electric car which is just good enough it will have huge impact on the air-quality in the cities and sine China is pretty much the only country which is developing and building new nuclear power plants as well as leading the research into fusion when it will be able to make even a 1/3rd of a Tesla it should have enough emission free electricity to actual make a big difference. China is also quite good at actually completing tasks it sets it's sights on no matter the "cost" or what the market says if the Government will put electric cars by 2025 as a mandate the rest will fall in line.
- 1971genocide 11y ago
  I agree with everything you just said - Just pointing out coping IP may be bad in the short term ( Tesla doesn't make as much money as they excepted ) - but in the long term its good for humanity.
  - rebootthesystem 11y ago
    In general terms, no, you are wrong. Why? The "R" in "R&D" is the expensive part. Very expensive. Ridiculously expensive in some segments (pharmaceuticals). Doing the "D" part once someone paid for the "R" part is easy and cheap. That's what stealing IP is about. If "R" was easy and inexpensive everyone would do it. Not so. The problem with saying "Oh, it's OK, China will make it better for humanity in the long run" is that killing-off companies that are engaged in heavy "R" creates a situation where all you have in the market is crap or you effectively freeze "R&D" for decades until the equation makes sense again or someone is stupid enough or rich enough to throw money at a problem. Patents and IP protection make a lot of sense when used for real inventions, real "improvements in the art". It is when they are used by trolls who make nothing, contribute nothing to society and get in the way of progress that patents turn evil. Stealing legitimate IP is a terrible thing. The only people who don't see it that way are those who have never devoted time, treasure and effort to find a solution for a difficult problem. That is when, in no uncertain terms, you absolutely get it. In my case, I devoted ten years in a constant effort to develop a technology. It was extremely difficult work. I funded all of it and it cost a bundle. At the end of the process anyone could have just taken the "D" part and gone with it with very little effort in relative terms. Go through something half as intensive as that and you'll understand where I and others are coming from.