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I suspect Tesla will be the next major story of burn rate fueled firms confronting reality...

• nojvek 9y ago
  That's what many said about Facebook when they had their crazy valuation. The same was said of Google before they figured out ads. Tesla has a brand value higher than any other car. It's not an app that can be easily replicated. The dynamics are not the same as Uber.
• exelius 9y ago
  Tesla is a different story entirely. Uber is burning cash by subsidizing operations (aka buying customers); Tesla is spending it on capital assets and R&D. Money spent on operations generally won't benefit you beyond the current quarter; but capital assets (including intellectual property as the result of R&D) retain value over time and often pay for themselves in a relatively short period of time. You'll notice a common thread throughout Elon Musk's "big bets" (Tesla, SpaceX, etc.) He is extremely conservative with operational spending, and all of these companies are very capital-intensive. Just look at the difference between a "Tesla Store" (small, maybe 3 or 4 employees, cars can be stored offsite wherever is cheap) and a normal auto dealership (huge, dozens of employees, majority of expensive real estate is used for parking cars). The Tesla store is very efficient compared to the auto dealer. When you have high capex, it makes it easier to fund your company through debt rather than equity since those loans/bonds are backed by capital assets with a non-zero liquidation value.