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Experts say Tesla has repeated car industry mistakes from the 1980s

205 points by evo_9 9y ago

HillaryBriss 9y ago
"... automation works best when it's added incrementally to a production process that's already working smoothly. And Musk seems to have made the same mistake Smith did: bringing in way too many robots, way too quickly, leaving little time for testing and refining the process." There's a certain naivete to the Tesla story. It has both strengths and weaknesses. I think Tesla will eventually be sold to an existing major car maker or just shut down.
- maxxxxx 9y ago
  "I think Tesla will eventually be sold to an existing major car maker or just shut down." I think Musk will lose interest once EVs are fully commoditized, progress slows down and Tesla needs to be optimized to every detail. He seems to be more interested in "heroic" achievements and big steps. Maybe they'll find a manager who is willing to run a regular company and then Tesla will just be another manufacturer.
  - HillaryBriss 9y ago
    i could easily be wrong, but, IMHO the hard challenge to being just another car manufacturer is that car manufacturing is already so competitive and dominated by large, well-funded global players. how can small upstart Tesla compete with that? up until now, the answer has been: by having this unique, kick-ass, smart, rare, high-priced and prestigious electric vehicle. the trouble is that the global majors are catching up and starting to offer their own kick-ass smart EVs. my humble guess is that no small upstart can survive as just another car manufacturer. they need a special advantage, some secret sauce. i fear Tesla won't have that in the future.
    - milesward 9y ago
      Humbly, I have yet to see any of the other players offer a kick-ass EV. Bolt is the closest, and it's pretty far from kick-ass.
      - Robotbeat 9y ago
        This. And the only one I've seen that might be a Tesla rival is BMW, but they're not much larger than Tesla and by the time they catch up to Tesla's electric car tech fully (some time in the mid 2020s), Tesla may actually have exceeded BMW's production capacity (2.5 million per year). And it's too bad. Toyota had a good thing going with Prius, but squandered a 2 decade head start by under-investing in pure electric and investing billions in the hydrogen dead-end. And GM has been under-investing in both the Volt and the Bolt, being content to just try to peel off a few other EV-centric customers from Nissan and Tesla instead of actually making a car with the marketing campaign and appeal of a mass market car. Charging networks is another place where the other car makers have been falling on their face. They often talk up charging networks, but it's still not possible to buy a car with something like Supercharger capability (only 50kW is broadly available on the car side, but only 25kW is typical for actual DC fast charge stations in the real world, at least in the US). Meanwhile, Tesla has continued to expand the Supercharger network.
        maxxxxx 9y ago
        BMW has revenues of 120 billion USD vs Tesla's 12 billion. I think that would qualify as "much larger". And BMW knows how to produce cars profitably.
        Robotbeat 9y ago
        BMW knows how to produce cars profitably after having a much higher production and a company infrastructure paid for over decades. Tesla will also be profitable when they're producing a couple million cars per year. And, given the streamlined buying process, will likely have higher margins.
  - loceng 9y ago
    I think Elon enjoys challenges, he's a holistic thinker with control and ownership developing more pieces of the puzzle than just electric vehicles, and he's incentivized with up to $55B if Tesla reaches $650B value. I believe he'll get there.
  - sowbug 9y ago
    That fits with Tesla's stated plan, which is "to accelerate the advent of sustainable transport by bringing compelling mass market electric cars to market as soon as possible." Tesla doesn't have to be the #1 auto manufacturer, nor does it even need to survive. As long as EVs are "fully commoditized," the company achieved its mission.
    - maxxxxx 9y ago
      I hope the investors have read this.
      - sowbug 9y ago
        It's hard to miss because they say it at least once during every earnings call, and it's been on their blog for around a decade. Moreover, wouldn't investors be happy to read it, according to your original point? If Musk becomes bored with a company that isn't doing what he cares about anymore because it's merely producing in-demand EV cars under a great brand, and he hands it to someone with skills like Tim Cook who can actually make the company run smoothly and profitability, isn't that the best of all worlds?
      - neolefty 9y ago
        Tesla can continue just fine after Elon moves on.
      - HillaryBriss 9y ago
        yes. so true. and, beyond merely selling off their shares, investors who could prove that management pursued a goal which significantly obstructed a reasonable return on investment probably have a viable lawsuit against management. the managers of publicly traded companies are supposed to pursue providing a return on investment. they aren't entitled to exclusively pursue other obstructive goals, even goals generally beneficial to society, company workers, the poor, etc. that's not what investors are buying into. of course, that doesn't mean investors would sue and it doesn't mean the government would necessarily investigate such a company. but there would be reasonable grounds for a lawsuit...
joobus 9y ago
> At the same time, it's rarely a good idea to underestimate Musk. Musk has a long history of setting optimistic deadlines for his companies and then failing to meet them. What? Don't underestimate him because he can't do what he says?
- 0xcde4c3db 9y ago
  I think the idea is that this isn't a new problem for Musk and it hasn't actually stopped his companies from hitting milestones, albeit late.
  - heavenlyblue 9y ago
    The only question is if his milestones are actually any better than the milestones for the most of the market. Blitzkrieg only works if the other parties do not take it into account.
    - Robotbeat 9y ago
      Considering Tesla is outselling all the other electric car makers (edit: in developed countries) and still ramping up, I’d say it’s working.
      - sfifs 9y ago
        Pretty sure BYD beats Tesla in EV numbers. I'm already seeing EV fleet taxis in Asian cities. https://www.google.com.sg/amp/s/insideevs.com/byd-1-world-plug-in-electric-car-sales-beats-tesla/amp/ https://www.google.com.sg/amp/s/insideevs.com/byd-1-world-pl...
        Robotbeat 9y ago
        China, sure. I believe that. But the car standards are different. These cars are not available in the west because they do not meet standards of developed countries. (Not saying they won't, eventually! I expect BYD and other Chinese firms to eventually be competing in the West as well.)
blattimwind 9y ago
Anyone who has had to do with the manufacturing side of car makers (German ones anyway) knows how highly optimized from end-to-end their processes are. It seems doubtful that anyone could leapfrog this amount of accumulated process knowledge and optimization simply by way of being new. Automation is not a black-and-white thing, either, as it is often portrayed. Sure, some things are fully automated (e.g. assembling the car body), but many things are partially automated. For example, there is a tool which is essentially 5/6/7 torque wrenches coupled to a lifting arm. This tool allows a line worker to mount a tire with little physical exertion in seconds. You see this sort of thing all the time at car assembly lines; offloading mechanical power to the machine, while having a human line up and steer things. (This also avoids a whole bunch of safety concerns you normally have when operating autonomous equipment in the same physical space occupied by humans) Another example: The body of virtually any car is self-supporting (there is no frame), so getting it right is rather critical. To achieve both the high strength and low weight of a modern car body the steel is deformed very closely to the maximum deformation it can withstand. This needs very good matching of the process to the steel. So, the manufacturer of the steel coil tests each coil individually for its exact properties. For mass production lines only coils meeting very tight tolerances are used. For low volume lines the process is adjusted individually for each coil based on the manufacturers testing and some in-house testing.
- maxxxxx 9y ago
  Agreed. This is not the tech industry where you can change direction anytime and do something totally new. Manufacturing physical goods is very hard especially something as complex as a car. I have worked at a German manufacturer for a while (chainsaws) and it's amazing how many people are working on optimizing processes. This is not something you can pick up in a few years.
  - abc_lisper 9y ago
    While I agree with the sentiment, I think we can be empathetic about where Musk comes from. The same arguments have been raised about making rockets, how non-states cannot make them, or how they cannot be reused. They probably even had good reasons for them. But still Musk and his team upended the status quo and showed it’s possible. His teams push the envelope forward all the time. Sure they are bound to have some failures - but hey we need people like him to understand what’s not possible(now)
yosito 9y ago
TL;DR the time and investment it takes to perfect fully automated car production is still prohibitive and has a poor return on investment. GM learned this the hard way in the 80s and Tesla is getting the same hard lesson now.
- Robotbeat 9y ago
  You didn't read until the end of the article. For instance: > "Musk likely could have spared himself a lot of short-term headaches if he had relied more heavily on auto industry veterans to warn him against repeating mistakes made by other car companies in previous decades. But if he had done that, he would also be less likely to discover ways to optimize the manufacturing process—particularly optimizations that work particularly well for a company specializing entirely in electric vehicles."
latch 9y ago
Although the article is focused on automation, I'd say almost all of the software industry is in a 20 year period of failing to learn much from TPS/lean (with no end in sight).
sjwright 9y ago
I agree entirely with the sentiment of the article, and I think Elon and Tesla are hopelessly deluding themselves with belief in their superior engineering and product design. But... Just because a few companies failed at factory automation in 1980 doesn't mean it couldn't succeed in 2018. It's patently absurd to knock Tesla for trying it again in the era of ultra-high resolution cameras and advanced machine learning algorithms.
- std_throwaway 9y ago
  It's not that other auto-makers were sleeping all this time. They build new factories every now and then and increase automation where appropriate. "ultra-high resolution" doesn't mean much if you can't see the problem. "advanced machine learning" sounds dangerous once the machine damaged itself or killed a bunch of people trying to figure out things.
- Robotbeat 9y ago
  This is true. But a key point: Tesla doesn't actually have to beat state of the art in automation to be profitable. Their cars are already great, electric cars are simpler, they've streamlined the sales process in a way that already gives them at least 10% greater cost advantage if everything else is equivalent (while also eliminating a major pain point for consumers). But it goes beyond just the fact that technology has advanced: Tesla is willing to pursue alternative approaches where others have long stopped (and this is a point the author of this article makes later on). The fact that Tesla doesn't have the conservative culture of other car makers means that they'll make mistakes like this, but also that they'll find new solutions (or recognize existing solutions in similar fields that haven't become industry standard) whereas others would not. You cannot automate EXISTING car designs much. And Model 3 does make improvements, but in many ways is built similar. It's like trying to automate soldering components by hand. Automation of electronics required a change in the fundamental way electronics were built. Through-hole is hard to automate but relatively easy to build by hand. Surface mount is simple to automate and ultimately better in several ways, but is super annoying to build by hand. Tesla needs to find the surface mount of car manufacturing. And I think they're trying. Something particularly hard to automate for automobiles is the wire harness. There are many degrees of freedom; it's kind of like tying your shoe: easy for humans, hard for machines. The Model 3 uses less wire than the Model S/X, but only by a factor of 2 or so. Model Y, on the other hand, is supposed to use like an order of magnitude less. This is like optimizing a circuit board for automation by only using a few through-hole components, relying mostly on surface mount. So Tesla is going to have to continually redesign their vehicles to be more and more amenable to automation. They can't do this as a step function, and Musk has realized that now. (This is another good point the author makes.)
DennisP 9y ago
I think it's reasonable to hypothesize that robotics has improved enough thirty years to try it again. Just didn't work out.
- kreetx 9y ago
  Exactly, it weren't probably the same mistakes that were made, but new ones -- related to automation, yes, with similar robot-tech, no. I'm also guessing that he's probably going to try again. ;)
FartyMcFarter 9y ago
> Musk said he wants all parts of the company ready to prepare 6,000 Model 3 cars per week by the end of June, triple the rate Tesla has achieved in the recent weeks. This sounds like madness, and I wonder if anyone believes them. Has anyone made a timeline or visualisation of Tesla's promised production rates vs reality? They appear to be constantly off, and now they're apparently doubling down and promising a production target that seems even less realistic than the ones they already failed to achieve.
- richardfeynman 9y ago
  Moreover, even if they achieve 6k/week, it'd take about 83 weeks to go through the 500k+ model 3 reservations.
  - pscsbs 9y ago
    That’s assuming they are going to plateau at 6k/week, which is certainly not their plan.
  - Robotbeat 9y ago
    Only if you (strangely) assume they won't keep ramping up.
    - Lionsion 9y ago
      Are they planning on opening other assembly plants? Their facility is going to hit a hard limit at some point, even if they do get their act together.
      - Robotbeat 9y ago
        Yes, they are.
  - DonbunEf7 9y ago
    Back-of-napkin math suggests that it'd take about 2-3mo, assuming that they'll need to triple capacity to make their target and that they can triple capacity twice again before exponential growth must slow to logistic growth.
lobsternumber1 9y ago
I think it comes from a basic lack of respect or understanding of the actual skill requires to work an assembly line properly. Highly educated creative class are trained their whole life to look down with disgust on the people who do repetitive labor. The name shows it.. They call it unskilled. And yet how many of them could do it? It takes an enormous amount of focus and concentration, the ability to learn complex routines quickly, to create efficiencies without breaking rythyms or rules. All while being payed less and treated like a second class employee. Why is toyota different? Because they dont think like this. Line workers are thought of highly. Their ideas are integrated into the system. Most of all they are not disposable cogs
- agumonkey 9y ago
  The pen versus the hand. What you do manually isn't expanded on paper, procedures and books. Yet it does require finesse, patience, precision, attention.
- ianai 9y ago
  The tech world seems particularly self reinforcing of this mindset. If your immediate job title doesn’t sound appropriately “tough” then you’re a fool and ignored. Here’s hoping I’ve just ran into a round of bad eggs. Otherwise I’m glad to hear about jobs that cannot be automated away.
  - ummonk 9y ago
    >If your immediate job title doesn’t sound appropriately “tough” then you’re a fool and ignored. And hence why programmers decided to appropriate the word "engineer" for their title...
    - JustSomeNobody 9y ago
      And "architect". Oh and those that work on "old" software are "maintenance" developers.
      - 9y ago
Robotbeat 9y ago
> "Far from leapfrogging the techniques of conventional automakers, Tesla is now struggling just to match the efficiency of its more established rivals." I don't think this is true any more. Tesla switched Model 3 from high automation approach at the end of 2017 to a more conventional approach using human labor where appropriate, but still is ramping up quickly and seems to find using human labor very effectively. That doesn't sound like they're struggling with the more traditional approach, but rather embracing it successfully (for Model 3). But I thought this line was good: > "Instead of easing robots onto the line a few at a time, providing for inevitable debugging problems with redundant equipment, GM bet the entire Hamtramck production system on the proposition that leading-edge automation would work instantaneously." Tesla does seem to be learning this lesson. And this is the right takeaway: learn respect for the way things are done, without losing the realization that something far better is possible. That reminds me of the ramp up of Falcon 9. > "Musk likely could have spared himself a lot of short-term headaches if he had relied more heavily on auto industry veterans to warn him against repeating mistakes made by other car companies in previous decades. But if he had done that, he would also be less likely to discover ways to optimize the manufacturing process—particularly optimizations that work particularly well for a company specializing entirely in electric vehicles." This is a good insight as well. Good article.
- dmckeon 9y ago
  1) Consider an assembly line where all tasks and material movements are done by humans. Over years, line operations are tuned to improve faster & better production. Even the vehicle designs are influenced by the capabilities of the line. 2) Machinery is introduced incrementally, supplementing or replacing each human task or material movement. Operations and designs continue to be tuned. 3) Eventually, a line has no humans - but the line design was created around humans, and still inherits constraints for human interaction. 4) Now, imagine a line where the entire line is designed for robots from the start. No humans doing production tasks at all, ever. Even the vehicles being produced are designed to facilitate robotic production. Henry Ford was level 1. Most modern US production is level 2, hoping to reach level 3. Tesla hoped to reach level 4, settled for available tech at level 3, and is having to fall back to level 2 in some areas. (IMHO). Is anyone manufacturing entire cars at level 4? How about major components (engines, transmssions, drivetrains)? edit: 1..3 are evolutionary, 4 is revolutionary.
ebbv 9y ago
Same topic already discussed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16891651 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16891651
jrcii 9y ago
I'll consider someone to have an "expert" opinion when they start their own car company that exceeds the performance of Tesla.
willart4food 9y ago
"Experts". Experts in . . . what?
btcindivist 9y ago
I'm confused that Tesla did not hire these experts. I see Munro & Associates dropping criticism, and am baffled, given so much expert knowledge available that no one hired these guys or their competition.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- pentae 9y ago
  Not dissing Munro & Associates, they seem highly competent - but i was amused that they literally have the conjoined triangle of success as their logo.
- pbreit 9y ago
  Why would you hire a bunch of critics? “Experts” are stuck in the past. It’s hard to find experts willing or able to let go of their baggage and apply their expertise to a current situation.
  - Rebelgecko 9y ago
    If you're trying to diagnose and fix problems, aren't critics exactly the kinds of people you want to to hire? Having a bunch of uncritical yes-men won't help you improve. When I watched the Munroe video, there's only one or two of their criticisms that I think a reasonable person would disagree with. Janky weatherstripping and doors that rub against the body of the car are bad regardless of any personal baggage.
  - btcindivist 9y ago
    I'm pretty sure SpaceX hired the old experts that are stuck in the past. There's nothing stopping you from iterating after the experts gave you a perfect start.
dnautics 9y ago
Well at least they aren't repeating mistakes from the 1920s
azinman2 9y ago
“that if Musk had listened to the experts, he probably wouldn't have started Tesla in the first place” Except he didn’t start Tesla, Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning did. Musk soon joined, but that’s not what was implied. I honestly expect better from Ars Technica. To me this is just more glorification of personality to god-like status. Yes he’s an impressive guy, but he’s never the only one singlehandedly making all the decisions, innovations, or executing the work.
- pbreit 9y ago
  Technically those other two filed the incorporation papers and started noodling around. It’s easy to imagine Tesla with Elon but impossible without. The “founders” didn’t get very far and the future was bleak.
  - azinman2 9y ago
    I’m not saying he wasn’t important. He’s considered a founder by Tesla. I’m just taking issue with the statement that he wouldn’t have started it if... because he didn’t.
xvilka 9y ago
The exact problems are not listed, moreover highly likely just a robot control program bugs.
na85 9y ago
>Musk is discovering that large-scale car manufacturing is really hard, and it's not easy to improve on the methods of conventional automakers. And while automation obviously plays an important role in car manufacturing, it's not the magic bullet Musk imagined a couple of years ago. Far from leapfrogging the techniques of conventional automakers, Tesla is now struggling just to match the efficiency of its more established rivals. This was the money quote for me. Maybe this dose of humble pie will be good. Not for Musk but for the legion of hero-worshippers who believe that some guy who founded PayPal can just "think from first principles" and outwit nearly a century of manufacturing and industrial innovation.
- yason 9y ago
  who believe that some guy who founded PayPal can just "think from first principles" and outwit nearly a century of manufacturing and industrial innovation I believe someone surely could, maybe Musk or maybe someone else. It does happen. The right smarts at the right time with the right money, etc. But were I to worship that hero I'd certainly keep my mouth shut until after he has delivered first.
- walshemj 9y ago
  Then again that is what W. Edwards Deming did for Japanese industry after being rebuffed by Ford etal
- erikpukinskis 9y ago
  It’s amazing how many people seem really bothered that Elon is a hero to many. I see comments like this a lot, “maybe Elon isn’t the worst, but you know what IS the worst? How people idolize him!”
illwrks 9y ago
What happens to customer owned Tesla cars IF Tesla fails?
- Lionsion 9y ago
  > What happens to customer owned Tesla cars IF Tesla fails? Considering the stranglehold Tesla has engineered on parts and maintenance information, not good things.
- otterley 9y ago
  My guess, based on the history of thousands of bankrupt companies past, is that a legacy auto manufacturer will buy Tesla's assets at an enormous discount and will serve Tesla's existing customer base as long as it's profitable to do so. Large companies rarely die, even in "failure" -- they just become part of a different company or are resurrected by hedge fund investors.
fit2rule 9y ago
Yeah, but .. that was the 80's, wasn't it? Its not like we haven't advanced things in the state of the art massively, since then - or? I mean, the Internet was really hard in the 80's too. But now look at it!
subroutine 9y ago
In an alternative universe Elon-5000 is slowly figuring out that his plan to fully autoprimate his vehicle plants using the latest in primate tech- humans; slow and weak swarm entities that are extremely cognitively flexible, cheap, energy efficient (fueld by almost anything green), with built in error checking, is not working out. A mix of traditional robotics from the 80s and advanced primate tech will be most efficient.
madengr 9y ago
I pulled behind a Model C a couple of days ago. Coukdn’t believe how poor the body panel alignment is, visible from 10’ away. There are no cars with these issues, not even economy cars.
pipio21 9y ago
I have devoted my professional live to manufacturing automation. From my point of view, what Musk tries to do is very hard, but if someone could do it it is him. There are differences between the 1880 and the 2018, in particular AI(artificial intelligence) today is "out of this world" tech compared to 1880s. Today you could solve things just by brute force AI that was simply impossible in the past. And Musk will probably do just that. If I had hundreds of millions of dollars I will do too. The great thing about automation is that once you solve something, it works forever. It takes way more work, of course getting it to work in the first place. Musk has as his best gift his total lack of doubt like young people that believe that nothing is impossible. It is very typical for this young people to crash over walls as they repeat the mistakes others have done. At the same time, it is young people who change the world when conditions change(and making the same mistakes do not yield the same output). “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”
ggm 9y ago
A common story in manufacturing is an anti-union story: labour pricing itself above what capital wants to spend. And a common sub-story in this story, is trying to use automation as a big cudgel to beat labour, especially organized labour with. And, Elon Musk is said (by unionists) to be pretty anti union. Silicon Valley is said to be pretty anti-union. New capital, the Ayn Randeans, they're pretty anti-union. So, I suspect there is another side to this story: If you want to try and use robots to avoid confronting your labour issues, you need to understand the value labour brings to an endevour. There is no dumb labour, there is only expensive and cheap labour. Cheap labour is rarely worth it. Expensive labour is often necessary. Cutting corners includes trying to avoid having to employ people. Jeff Bizos is also very anti unions. But, he automated very slowly. I think his work floor practices in the packing mills he runs is very bad, but if we discount that, it is perhaps far more sensible: learn how to run supply chain logistics with the minimum sensible automation, then slowly increase. I suspect had Musk swallowed his pride, and his anti union and anti labour views, and employed people, and organised labour, he might have avoided this problem. Of course, he would have walked into another problem: organised labour is not cheap. But then, a tesla isn't cheap either. How does he make rockets? Does he use robots, or people, or a blend of both?
unclebucknasty 9y ago
>"Excessive automation at Tesla was a mistake," Musk tweeted recently. "Humans are underrated." Ironic to hear this from a company that is aiming to build autonomous vehicles.
x3y3z3 9y ago
A friend of mine who worked at one of Elon's companies for a number of years was often flabbergasted by the hubris involved in a culture that seemed to insist on repeating almost every single mistake of the past in search of solutions known to those skilled in the art. Valuable time and very large amounts of money are being wasted on engaging in a constant game of reinventing the wheel. I was told many people brought this up to Elon internally, often with materially negative effect for them. My friend never did, BTW, because he saw what happened and didn't want any part of it. He kept his mouth shut and moved-on on to a competitor where engineers don't waste time and money reinventing every last thing. He said that Elon is a very smart and truly remarkable guy, but one who lives in an echo chamber within which nobody has the balls to oppose him. Elon seems to be known for unleashing verbal hell in meetings at anyone who dares, insulting them and generally chopping them up in front of their colleagues. Very soon nobody wants to say anything more than necessary, if that. Everyone is in fear of going into a meeting with Elon and getting shredded. The above is an account I heard from a third party. I have no clue as to the veracity of these statements. The reader is advised to assume them to be false and conduct their own research.
xiphias 9y ago
GM: ,,Workers could do nothing but stand around and wait while managers called in the robot contractor's technicians'' When you outsource the most important things to do as a company (maintaining and programming robots), of course you will fail. What Tesla tried is probably just a few years away.
buvanshak 9y ago
Seriously. I sometimes thing if these articles are doing for Elon Musk. So Mr Musk is attempting something, let us call this X. If he simply do it, no one else notices, and the future potential investors might fail to notice...Same if he fails. So he has to make sure that they notice when he succeeds. What better way than to make a bunch of articles that says what he is trying to do is impossible. Then if he succeeds, then the (artificial) voices that were saying what he is doing is impossible, ends up amplifying his success 100 fold. If he fails, then not much of his current reputation is changed. So if you are handling PR for Elon Musk. Why wouldn't you make these articles happen?

205 points by evo_9 9y ago

"... automation works best when it's added incrementally to a production process that's already working smoothly. And Musk seems to have made the same mistake Smith did: bringing in way too many robots, way too quickly, leaving little time for testing and refining the process." There's a certain naivete to the Tesla story. It has both strengths and weaknesses. I think Tesla will eventually be sold to an existing major car maker or just shut down.

maxxxxx 9y ago
"I think Tesla will eventually be sold to an existing major car maker or just shut down." I think Musk will lose interest once EVs are fully commoditized, progress slows down and Tesla needs to be optimized to every detail. He seems to be more interested in "heroic" achievements and big steps. Maybe they'll find a manager who is willing to run a regular company and then Tesla will just be another manufacturer.
- HillaryBriss 9y ago
  i could easily be wrong, but, IMHO the hard challenge to being just another car manufacturer is that car manufacturing is already so competitive and dominated by large, well-funded global players. how can small upstart Tesla compete with that? up until now, the answer has been: by having this unique, kick-ass, smart, rare, high-priced and prestigious electric vehicle. the trouble is that the global majors are catching up and starting to offer their own kick-ass smart EVs. my humble guess is that no small upstart can survive as just another car manufacturer. they need a special advantage, some secret sauce. i fear Tesla won't have that in the future.
  - milesward 9y ago
    Humbly, I have yet to see any of the other players offer a kick-ass EV. Bolt is the closest, and it's pretty far from kick-ass.
    - Robotbeat 9y ago
      This. And the only one I've seen that might be a Tesla rival is BMW, but they're not much larger than Tesla and by the time they catch up to Tesla's electric car tech fully (some time in the mid 2020s), Tesla may actually have exceeded BMW's production capacity (2.5 million per year). And it's too bad. Toyota had a good thing going with Prius, but squandered a 2 decade head start by under-investing in pure electric and investing billions in the hydrogen dead-end. And GM has been under-investing in both the Volt and the Bolt, being content to just try to peel off a few other EV-centric customers from Nissan and Tesla instead of actually making a car with the marketing campaign and appeal of a mass market car. Charging networks is another place where the other car makers have been falling on their face. They often talk up charging networks, but it's still not possible to buy a car with something like Supercharger capability (only 50kW is broadly available on the car side, but only 25kW is typical for actual DC fast charge stations in the real world, at least in the US). Meanwhile, Tesla has continued to expand the Supercharger network.
      - maxxxxx 9y ago
        BMW has revenues of 120 billion USD vs Tesla's 12 billion. I think that would qualify as "much larger". And BMW knows how to produce cars profitably.
        Robotbeat 9y ago
        BMW knows how to produce cars profitably after having a much higher production and a company infrastructure paid for over decades. Tesla will also be profitable when they're producing a couple million cars per year. And, given the streamlined buying process, will likely have higher margins.
- loceng 9y ago
  I think Elon enjoys challenges, he's a holistic thinker with control and ownership developing more pieces of the puzzle than just electric vehicles, and he's incentivized with up to $55B if Tesla reaches $650B value. I believe he'll get there.
- sowbug 9y ago
  That fits with Tesla's stated plan, which is "to accelerate the advent of sustainable transport by bringing compelling mass market electric cars to market as soon as possible." Tesla doesn't have to be the #1 auto manufacturer, nor does it even need to survive. As long as EVs are "fully commoditized," the company achieved its mission.
  - maxxxxx 9y ago
    I hope the investors have read this.
    - sowbug 9y ago
      It's hard to miss because they say it at least once during every earnings call, and it's been on their blog for around a decade. Moreover, wouldn't investors be happy to read it, according to your original point? If Musk becomes bored with a company that isn't doing what he cares about anymore because it's merely producing in-demand EV cars under a great brand, and he hands it to someone with skills like Tim Cook who can actually make the company run smoothly and profitability, isn't that the best of all worlds?
    - neolefty 9y ago
      Tesla can continue just fine after Elon moves on.
    - HillaryBriss 9y ago
      yes. so true. and, beyond merely selling off their shares, investors who could prove that management pursued a goal which significantly obstructed a reasonable return on investment probably have a viable lawsuit against management. the managers of publicly traded companies are supposed to pursue providing a return on investment. they aren't entitled to exclusively pursue other obstructive goals, even goals generally beneficial to society, company workers, the poor, etc. that's not what investors are buying into. of course, that doesn't mean investors would sue and it doesn't mean the government would necessarily investigate such a company. but there would be reasonable grounds for a lawsuit...

joobus 9y ago

> At the same time, it's rarely a good idea to underestimate Musk. Musk has a long history of setting optimistic deadlines for his companies and then failing to meet them. What? Don't underestimate him because he can't do what he says?

0xcde4c3db 9y ago
I think the idea is that this isn't a new problem for Musk and it hasn't actually stopped his companies from hitting milestones, albeit late.
- heavenlyblue 9y ago
  The only question is if his milestones are actually any better than the milestones for the most of the market. Blitzkrieg only works if the other parties do not take it into account.
  - Robotbeat 9y ago
    Considering Tesla is outselling all the other electric car makers (edit: in developed countries) and still ramping up, I’d say it’s working.
    - sfifs 9y ago
      Pretty sure BYD beats Tesla in EV numbers. I'm already seeing EV fleet taxis in Asian cities. https://www.google.com.sg/amp/s/insideevs.com/byd-1-world-plug-in-electric-car-sales-beats-tesla/amp/ https://www.google.com.sg/amp/s/insideevs.com/byd-1-world-pl...
      - Robotbeat 9y ago
        China, sure. I believe that. But the car standards are different. These cars are not available in the west because they do not meet standards of developed countries. (Not saying they won't, eventually! I expect BYD and other Chinese firms to eventually be competing in the West as well.)

blattimwind 9y ago

Anyone who has had to do with the manufacturing side of car makers (German ones anyway) knows how highly optimized from end-to-end their processes are. It seems doubtful that anyone could leapfrog this amount of accumulated process knowledge and optimization simply by way of being new. Automation is not a black-and-white thing, either, as it is often portrayed. Sure, some things are fully automated (e.g. assembling the car body), but many things are partially automated. For example, there is a tool which is essentially 5/6/7 torque wrenches coupled to a lifting arm. This tool allows a line worker to mount a tire with little physical exertion in seconds. You see this sort of thing all the time at car assembly lines; offloading mechanical power to the machine, while having a human line up and steer things. (This also avoids a whole bunch of safety concerns you normally have when operating autonomous equipment in the same physical space occupied by humans) Another example: The body of virtually any car is self-supporting (there is no frame), so getting it right is rather critical. To achieve both the high strength and low weight of a modern car body the steel is deformed very closely to the maximum deformation it can withstand. This needs very good matching of the process to the steel. So, the manufacturer of the steel coil tests each coil individually for its exact properties. For mass production lines only coils meeting very tight tolerances are used. For low volume lines the process is adjusted individually for each coil based on the manufacturers testing and some in-house testing.

maxxxxx 9y ago
Agreed. This is not the tech industry where you can change direction anytime and do something totally new. Manufacturing physical goods is very hard especially something as complex as a car. I have worked at a German manufacturer for a while (chainsaws) and it's amazing how many people are working on optimizing processes. This is not something you can pick up in a few years.
- abc_lisper 9y ago
  While I agree with the sentiment, I think we can be empathetic about where Musk comes from. The same arguments have been raised about making rockets, how non-states cannot make them, or how they cannot be reused. They probably even had good reasons for them. But still Musk and his team upended the status quo and showed it’s possible. His teams push the envelope forward all the time. Sure they are bound to have some failures - but hey we need people like him to understand what’s not possible(now)

yosito 9y ago

TL;DR the time and investment it takes to perfect fully automated car production is still prohibitive and has a poor return on investment. GM learned this the hard way in the 80s and Tesla is getting the same hard lesson now.

Robotbeat 9y ago
You didn't read until the end of the article. For instance: > "Musk likely could have spared himself a lot of short-term headaches if he had relied more heavily on auto industry veterans to warn him against repeating mistakes made by other car companies in previous decades. But if he had done that, he would also be less likely to discover ways to optimize the manufacturing process—particularly optimizations that work particularly well for a company specializing entirely in electric vehicles."

latch 9y ago

Although the article is focused on automation, I'd say almost all of the software industry is in a 20 year period of failing to learn much from TPS/lean (with no end in sight).

sjwright 9y ago

I agree entirely with the sentiment of the article, and I think Elon and Tesla are hopelessly deluding themselves with belief in their superior engineering and product design. But... Just because a few companies failed at factory automation in 1980 doesn't mean it couldn't succeed in 2018. It's patently absurd to knock Tesla for trying it again in the era of ultra-high resolution cameras and advanced machine learning algorithms.

std_throwaway 9y ago
It's not that other auto-makers were sleeping all this time. They build new factories every now and then and increase automation where appropriate. "ultra-high resolution" doesn't mean much if you can't see the problem. "advanced machine learning" sounds dangerous once the machine damaged itself or killed a bunch of people trying to figure out things.
Robotbeat 9y ago
This is true. But a key point: Tesla doesn't actually have to beat state of the art in automation to be profitable. Their cars are already great, electric cars are simpler, they've streamlined the sales process in a way that already gives them at least 10% greater cost advantage if everything else is equivalent (while also eliminating a major pain point for consumers). But it goes beyond just the fact that technology has advanced: Tesla is willing to pursue alternative approaches where others have long stopped (and this is a point the author of this article makes later on). The fact that Tesla doesn't have the conservative culture of other car makers means that they'll make mistakes like this, but also that they'll find new solutions (or recognize existing solutions in similar fields that haven't become industry standard) whereas others would not. You cannot automate EXISTING car designs much. And Model 3 does make improvements, but in many ways is built similar. It's like trying to automate soldering components by hand. Automation of electronics required a change in the fundamental way electronics were built. Through-hole is hard to automate but relatively easy to build by hand. Surface mount is simple to automate and ultimately better in several ways, but is super annoying to build by hand. Tesla needs to find the surface mount of car manufacturing. And I think they're trying. Something particularly hard to automate for automobiles is the wire harness. There are many degrees of freedom; it's kind of like tying your shoe: easy for humans, hard for machines. The Model 3 uses less wire than the Model S/X, but only by a factor of 2 or so. Model Y, on the other hand, is supposed to use like an order of magnitude less. This is like optimizing a circuit board for automation by only using a few through-hole components, relying mostly on surface mount. So Tesla is going to have to continually redesign their vehicles to be more and more amenable to automation. They can't do this as a step function, and Musk has realized that now. (This is another good point the author makes.)

DennisP 9y ago

I think it's reasonable to hypothesize that robotics has improved enough thirty years to try it again. Just didn't work out.

kreetx 9y ago
Exactly, it weren't probably the same mistakes that were made, but new ones -- related to automation, yes, with similar robot-tech, no. I'm also guessing that he's probably going to try again. ;)

FartyMcFarter 9y ago

> Musk said he wants all parts of the company ready to prepare 6,000 Model 3 cars per week by the end of June, triple the rate Tesla has achieved in the recent weeks. This sounds like madness, and I wonder if anyone believes them. Has anyone made a timeline or visualisation of Tesla's promised production rates vs reality? They appear to be constantly off, and now they're apparently doubling down and promising a production target that seems even less realistic than the ones they already failed to achieve.

richardfeynman 9y ago
Moreover, even if they achieve 6k/week, it'd take about 83 weeks to go through the 500k+ model 3 reservations.
- pscsbs 9y ago
  That’s assuming they are going to plateau at 6k/week, which is certainly not their plan.
- Robotbeat 9y ago
  Only if you (strangely) assume they won't keep ramping up.
  - Lionsion 9y ago
    Are they planning on opening other assembly plants? Their facility is going to hit a hard limit at some point, even if they do get their act together.
    - Robotbeat 9y ago
      Yes, they are.
- DonbunEf7 9y ago
  Back-of-napkin math suggests that it'd take about 2-3mo, assuming that they'll need to triple capacity to make their target and that they can triple capacity twice again before exponential growth must slow to logistic growth.

lobsternumber1 9y ago

I think it comes from a basic lack of respect or understanding of the actual skill requires to work an assembly line properly. Highly educated creative class are trained their whole life to look down with disgust on the people who do repetitive labor. The name shows it.. They call it unskilled. And yet how many of them could do it? It takes an enormous amount of focus and concentration, the ability to learn complex routines quickly, to create efficiencies without breaking rythyms or rules. All while being payed less and treated like a second class employee. Why is toyota different? Because they dont think like this. Line workers are thought of highly. Their ideas are integrated into the system. Most of all they are not disposable cogs

agumonkey 9y ago
The pen versus the hand. What you do manually isn't expanded on paper, procedures and books. Yet it does require finesse, patience, precision, attention.
ianai 9y ago
The tech world seems particularly self reinforcing of this mindset. If your immediate job title doesn’t sound appropriately “tough” then you’re a fool and ignored. Here’s hoping I’ve just ran into a round of bad eggs. Otherwise I’m glad to hear about jobs that cannot be automated away.
- ummonk 9y ago
  >If your immediate job title doesn’t sound appropriately “tough” then you’re a fool and ignored. And hence why programmers decided to appropriate the word "engineer" for their title...
  - JustSomeNobody 9y ago
    And "architect". Oh and those that work on "old" software are "maintenance" developers.
    - 9y ago

Robotbeat 9y ago

> "Far from leapfrogging the techniques of conventional automakers, Tesla is now struggling just to match the efficiency of its more established rivals." I don't think this is true any more. Tesla switched Model 3 from high automation approach at the end of 2017 to a more conventional approach using human labor where appropriate, but still is ramping up quickly and seems to find using human labor very effectively. That doesn't sound like they're struggling with the more traditional approach, but rather embracing it successfully (for Model 3). But I thought this line was good: > "Instead of easing robots onto the line a few at a time, providing for inevitable debugging problems with redundant equipment, GM bet the entire Hamtramck production system on the proposition that leading-edge automation would work instantaneously." Tesla does seem to be learning this lesson. And this is the right takeaway: learn respect for the way things are done, without losing the realization that something far better is possible. That reminds me of the ramp up of Falcon 9. > "Musk likely could have spared himself a lot of short-term headaches if he had relied more heavily on auto industry veterans to warn him against repeating mistakes made by other car companies in previous decades. But if he had done that, he would also be less likely to discover ways to optimize the manufacturing process—particularly optimizations that work particularly well for a company specializing entirely in electric vehicles." This is a good insight as well. Good article.

dmckeon 9y ago
1) Consider an assembly line where all tasks and material movements are done by humans. Over years, line operations are tuned to improve faster & better production. Even the vehicle designs are influenced by the capabilities of the line. 2) Machinery is introduced incrementally, supplementing or replacing each human task or material movement. Operations and designs continue to be tuned. 3) Eventually, a line has no humans - but the line design was created around humans, and still inherits constraints for human interaction. 4) Now, imagine a line where the entire line is designed for robots from the start. No humans doing production tasks at all, ever. Even the vehicles being produced are designed to facilitate robotic production. Henry Ford was level 1. Most modern US production is level 2, hoping to reach level 3. Tesla hoped to reach level 4, settled for available tech at level 3, and is having to fall back to level 2 in some areas. (IMHO). Is anyone manufacturing entire cars at level 4? How about major components (engines, transmssions, drivetrains)? edit: 1..3 are evolutionary, 4 is revolutionary.

ebbv 9y ago

Same topic already discussed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16891651 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16891651

jrcii 9y ago

I'll consider someone to have an "expert" opinion when they start their own car company that exceeds the performance of Tesla.

willart4food 9y ago

"Experts". Experts in . . . what?

btcindivist 9y ago

I'm confused that Tesla did not hire these experts. I see Munro & Associates dropping criticism, and am baffled, given so much expert knowledge available that no one hired these guys or their competition.

deleted 9y ago
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pentae 9y ago
Not dissing Munro & Associates, they seem highly competent - but i was amused that they literally have the conjoined triangle of success as their logo.
pbreit 9y ago
Why would you hire a bunch of critics? “Experts” are stuck in the past. It’s hard to find experts willing or able to let go of their baggage and apply their expertise to a current situation.
- Rebelgecko 9y ago
  If you're trying to diagnose and fix problems, aren't critics exactly the kinds of people you want to to hire? Having a bunch of uncritical yes-men won't help you improve. When I watched the Munroe video, there's only one or two of their criticisms that I think a reasonable person would disagree with. Janky weatherstripping and doors that rub against the body of the car are bad regardless of any personal baggage.
- btcindivist 9y ago
  I'm pretty sure SpaceX hired the old experts that are stuck in the past. There's nothing stopping you from iterating after the experts gave you a perfect start.

dnautics 9y ago

Well at least they aren't repeating mistakes from the 1920s

azinman2 9y ago

“that if Musk had listened to the experts, he probably wouldn't have started Tesla in the first place” Except he didn’t start Tesla, Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning did. Musk soon joined, but that’s not what was implied. I honestly expect better from Ars Technica. To me this is just more glorification of personality to god-like status. Yes he’s an impressive guy, but he’s never the only one singlehandedly making all the decisions, innovations, or executing the work.

pbreit 9y ago
Technically those other two filed the incorporation papers and started noodling around. It’s easy to imagine Tesla with Elon but impossible without. The “founders” didn’t get very far and the future was bleak.
- azinman2 9y ago
  I’m not saying he wasn’t important. He’s considered a founder by Tesla. I’m just taking issue with the statement that he wouldn’t have started it if... because he didn’t.

xvilka 9y ago

The exact problems are not listed, moreover highly likely just a robot control program bugs.

na85 9y ago

>Musk is discovering that large-scale car manufacturing is really hard, and it's not easy to improve on the methods of conventional automakers. And while automation obviously plays an important role in car manufacturing, it's not the magic bullet Musk imagined a couple of years ago. Far from leapfrogging the techniques of conventional automakers, Tesla is now struggling just to match the efficiency of its more established rivals. This was the money quote for me. Maybe this dose of humble pie will be good. Not for Musk but for the legion of hero-worshippers who believe that some guy who founded PayPal can just "think from first principles" and outwit nearly a century of manufacturing and industrial innovation.

yason 9y ago
who believe that some guy who founded PayPal can just "think from first principles" and outwit nearly a century of manufacturing and industrial innovation I believe someone surely could, maybe Musk or maybe someone else. It does happen. The right smarts at the right time with the right money, etc. But were I to worship that hero I'd certainly keep my mouth shut until after he has delivered first.
walshemj 9y ago
Then again that is what W. Edwards Deming did for Japanese industry after being rebuffed by Ford etal
erikpukinskis 9y ago
It’s amazing how many people seem really bothered that Elon is a hero to many. I see comments like this a lot, “maybe Elon isn’t the worst, but you know what IS the worst? How people idolize him!”

illwrks 9y ago

What happens to customer owned Tesla cars IF Tesla fails?

Lionsion 9y ago
> What happens to customer owned Tesla cars IF Tesla fails? Considering the stranglehold Tesla has engineered on parts and maintenance information, not good things.
otterley 9y ago
My guess, based on the history of thousands of bankrupt companies past, is that a legacy auto manufacturer will buy Tesla's assets at an enormous discount and will serve Tesla's existing customer base as long as it's profitable to do so. Large companies rarely die, even in "failure" -- they just become part of a different company or are resurrected by hedge fund investors.

fit2rule 9y ago

Yeah, but .. that was the 80's, wasn't it? Its not like we haven't advanced things in the state of the art massively, since then - or? I mean, the Internet was really hard in the 80's too. But now look at it!

subroutine 9y ago

In an alternative universe Elon-5000 is slowly figuring out that his plan to fully autoprimate his vehicle plants using the latest in primate tech- humans; slow and weak swarm entities that are extremely cognitively flexible, cheap, energy efficient (fueld by almost anything green), with built in error checking, is not working out. A mix of traditional robotics from the 80s and advanced primate tech will be most efficient.

madengr 9y ago

I pulled behind a Model C a couple of days ago. Coukdn’t believe how poor the body panel alignment is, visible from 10’ away. There are no cars with these issues, not even economy cars.

pipio21 9y ago

I have devoted my professional live to manufacturing automation. From my point of view, what Musk tries to do is very hard, but if someone could do it it is him. There are differences between the 1880 and the 2018, in particular AI(artificial intelligence) today is "out of this world" tech compared to 1880s. Today you could solve things just by brute force AI that was simply impossible in the past. And Musk will probably do just that. If I had hundreds of millions of dollars I will do too. The great thing about automation is that once you solve something, it works forever. It takes way more work, of course getting it to work in the first place. Musk has as his best gift his total lack of doubt like young people that believe that nothing is impossible. It is very typical for this young people to crash over walls as they repeat the mistakes others have done. At the same time, it is young people who change the world when conditions change(and making the same mistakes do not yield the same output). “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”

ggm 9y ago

A common story in manufacturing is an anti-union story: labour pricing itself above what capital wants to spend. And a common sub-story in this story, is trying to use automation as a big cudgel to beat labour, especially organized labour with. And, Elon Musk is said (by unionists) to be pretty anti union. Silicon Valley is said to be pretty anti-union. New capital, the Ayn Randeans, they're pretty anti-union. So, I suspect there is another side to this story: If you want to try and use robots to avoid confronting your labour issues, you need to understand the value labour brings to an endevour. There is no dumb labour, there is only expensive and cheap labour. Cheap labour is rarely worth it. Expensive labour is often necessary. Cutting corners includes trying to avoid having to employ people. Jeff Bizos is also very anti unions. But, he automated very slowly. I think his work floor practices in the packing mills he runs is very bad, but if we discount that, it is perhaps far more sensible: learn how to run supply chain logistics with the minimum sensible automation, then slowly increase. I suspect had Musk swallowed his pride, and his anti union and anti labour views, and employed people, and organised labour, he might have avoided this problem. Of course, he would have walked into another problem: organised labour is not cheap. But then, a tesla isn't cheap either. How does he make rockets? Does he use robots, or people, or a blend of both?

unclebucknasty 9y ago

>"Excessive automation at Tesla was a mistake," Musk tweeted recently. "Humans are underrated." Ironic to hear this from a company that is aiming to build autonomous vehicles.

x3y3z3 9y ago

A friend of mine who worked at one of Elon's companies for a number of years was often flabbergasted by the hubris involved in a culture that seemed to insist on repeating almost every single mistake of the past in search of solutions known to those skilled in the art. Valuable time and very large amounts of money are being wasted on engaging in a constant game of reinventing the wheel. I was told many people brought this up to Elon internally, often with materially negative effect for them. My friend never did, BTW, because he saw what happened and didn't want any part of it. He kept his mouth shut and moved-on on to a competitor where engineers don't waste time and money reinventing every last thing. He said that Elon is a very smart and truly remarkable guy, but one who lives in an echo chamber within which nobody has the balls to oppose him. Elon seems to be known for unleashing verbal hell in meetings at anyone who dares, insulting them and generally chopping them up in front of their colleagues. Very soon nobody wants to say anything more than necessary, if that. Everyone is in fear of going into a meeting with Elon and getting shredded. The above is an account I heard from a third party. I have no clue as to the veracity of these statements. The reader is advised to assume them to be false and conduct their own research.

xiphias 9y ago

GM: ,,Workers could do nothing but stand around and wait while managers called in the robot contractor's technicians'' When you outsource the most important things to do as a company (maintaining and programming robots), of course you will fail. What Tesla tried is probably just a few years away.

buvanshak 9y ago

Seriously. I sometimes thing if these articles are doing for Elon Musk. So Mr Musk is attempting something, let us call this X. If he simply do it, no one else notices, and the future potential investors might fail to notice...Same if he fails. So he has to make sure that they notice when he succeeds. What better way than to make a bunch of articles that says what he is trying to do is impossible. Then if he succeeds, then the (artificial) voices that were saying what he is doing is impossible, ends up amplifying his success 100 fold. If he fails, then not much of his current reputation is changed. So if you are handling PR for Elon Musk. Why wouldn't you make these articles happen?