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> Then, by 2021 or so, we'll look back at a company making over a million electric cars per year at high margin Yeah, sure. Why not say that it is "most likely

by skgoa 9y ago

> Then, by 2021 or so, we'll look back at a company making over a million electric cars per year at high margin Yeah, sure. Why not say that it is "most likely" that they will have a colony on Mars by that time, too? > dwarfing the entire rest of the electric car production rate (with the possible exception of China...). Even at a million cars per year, Tesla would not dwarf the production of the many other EVs that will come out in the next 3 years. I also don't see what this has to do with Tesla being profitable and surviving as a company. > But exponential ramp-ups tend to catch people off-guard after hearing small numbers at the beginning of the ramp and early delays. However, exponential ramp ups are not typical with a product as complex as a car and Tesla has shown no ability to actually pull it off. Tesla is the least automated mass-producting car manufacturer. Tesla currently requires 35 (yes, thirty-five!) workers per car produced per day. This is ten times of what is normal in the automotive industry. Going by their own numbers, they have shown a sustained output below 800 cars per week, with only managing to produce 2020 briefly in the 7 day period ending on April 2nd. And this is after they installed an entirely new production line and made a company-wide all hands on deck push that is not sustainable. I'm not saying Tesla is going to crash and burn tommorrow. They still have some chance of making it through these hard times, if investors' and creditors' confidence holds up. But just handwaving away the massive headwinds they face isn't sensible, either.

Robotbeat 9y ago
> Even at a million cars per year, Tesla would not dwarf the production of the many other EVs that will come out in the next 3 years. Oh, I know BMW and others claim to be moving towards EVs, but the press release vs actual deployment is much worse even than Tesla. Tesla's manufacturing numbers until now were almost all high-end luxury vehicles, so of course they wouldn't equal conventional manufacturers on automation and mass production. Additionally, of course Tesla's worker numbers look worse than a non-vertically-integrated company that just buys parts (of course, those parts also require a whole bunch of workers that aren't counted). Sure, you can think they only can make 800 cars per week, but customers are getting their cars now at a faster rate. I'm merely saying what will most likely happen, not what's PROVEN BEYOND ALL DOUBT.

by skgoa 9y ago

Robotbeat 9y ago

> Even at a million cars per year, Tesla would not dwarf the production of the many other EVs that will come out in the next 3 years. Oh, I know BMW and others claim to be moving towards EVs, but the press release vs actual deployment is much worse even than Tesla. Tesla's manufacturing numbers until now were almost all high-end luxury vehicles, so of course they wouldn't equal conventional manufacturers on automation and mass production. Additionally, of course Tesla's worker numbers look worse than a non-vertically-integrated company that just buys parts (of course, those parts also require a whole bunch of workers that aren't counted). Sure, you can think they only can make 800 cars per week, but customers are getting their cars now at a faster rate. I'm merely saying what will most likely happen, not what's PROVEN BEYOND ALL DOUBT.