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The question no-one asked. How difficult is it for BYD to clone his autopilot chip and will that stop the Chinese from exporting knockoffs because I'm certain

The question no-one asked. How difficult is it for BYD to clone his autopilot chip and will that stop the Chinese from exporting knockoffs because I'm certain they can close the data and software gap instantly by swapping out a harddrive or 10. I think he's got 10 years before the chinese chip fabs catch up. Musk's question how did Tesla build the best AI chip for driving in the world without being a chip designer was the far more interesting yet overlooked question. Musk has a talent for framing problems appropriately so that optimum solutions emerge with a minimum deployment of capital. And he's not secretive about it, he applies his training in physics and phenomenal knowledge to make good bets and eventually identifies and acknowledges his mistakes. Tesla doesn't have an advertising budget. Musk couldn't care less about it's shareprice but I think he will be a bit perturbed if identical technology emerges faster than he foresaw as was Apple when the Android ecosystem emerged. As it stands with his chip and data it is game set and match for autonomous driving which is a software game and the leader takes all the data and a fully autonomous vehicle is worth significantly more than non-autonomous vehicle and if you are data scientist you probably want to work for the company with the best data-set and highest remuneration. The data is the gold and Tesla owns it and no-one can steal it and use it for at least 10 years by which point battery vehicles will be cheaper than petrol vehicles which is the major problem with the model 3. It is currently uneconomic against a toyota corolla but gains ground with every piece of battery and energy storage research that musk does not pay for.

dominotw 7y ago
> Musk couldn't care less about it's shareprice seems to be constantly tweeting about it though.
FireBeyond 7y ago
> Tesla doesn't have an advertising budget. This is an oft-repeated trope, but one look at Tesla's reports will show it's not the case. Last year, approaching $100M (I want to say certainly greater than $80M) spent on "Advertising and marketing".
- zaroth 7y ago
  Absolutely true. I’m sure the Referral program cost is the majority of that. They have a highly effective, modestly funded, non-traditional advertising strategy.
- harry8 7y ago
  I really hope the onion writers they hired are getting well paid as a part of that.
newsoul2019 7y ago
>> if identical technology emerges faster than he foresaw as was Apple when the Android ecosystem emerged Android is hardly an "identical technology". Where's the Secure Enclave? To this day, Android is too insecure and too risky for anyone to depend on.
threeseed 7y ago
1) It isn't the best AI chip in the world. And Tesla doesn't have the most advanced self driving program around. 2) I can't remember a CEO who has complained more about the stock price in particular those shorting the stock. And worst of all then go on to illegally manipulate the market to target them. 3) You have that completely backwards. Musk is the worst at solving problems with the least capital. Look at the way his manufacturing processes work or the decision to build out the Supercharger network/Gigafactory. There are definitely cheaper ways to do those. Better probably not. Cheaper yes. 4) I have worked with more Data Scientists than most and I assure you that they are just like everyone else. They care most about: company reputation, work environment, money, challenging problems etc. It's not just whether there is a great dataset or not.
- curyous 7y ago
  Can you name a better AI chip, especially in terms of TFLOPs per Watt?
  - threeseed 7y ago
    You're moving the goalposts. It was about the best AI chip in general not based on some arbitrary efficiency number.
    - zaroth 7y ago
      TOPS per Watt is a highly meaningful metric that matters a lot in the real world. It’s a valid definition of “best”. No one cares how many TOPS your 500watt non-redundant monster can run, because it’s not being put in an EV.
      - threeseed 7y ago
        It does matter how the best AI chip performs irrespective of efficiency. Because self driving cars are a multi-year journey and those platforms will likely become more efficient.
mrep 7y ago
I've never invested in an individual stock but their full self driving tech strategy is making me highly consider going long on TSLA. I think whoever develops level 4 FSD tech that works for most Americans daily car commute is going to be a trillion dollar company. It can even require me to be in the driver's seat, not work in rain/snow, and be geofenced if it gives me at least a 5+ seconds heads up for taking over as long as it is enough time to switch context from working/whatever to drive. Think about how much time Americans spend driving for which we could free ourselves from if our cars had FSD tech that worked most of the time. If/when I have a decent commute that benefits from a car over public transportation, I would pay thousands of dollars extra for a car if it was able to free myself from driving 75% of the time. Tesla now has got hundreds of thousands of cars that people use in level 3 mode which is then used to train their L4/L5 FSD tech while also retaining all of that real world data to train their models. I don't work for self driving tech, but given the massive amount of real world data they can collect, I think they are now most likely to hit the point where they can solve basic commutes in geofenced areas with L4 over everyone else and I think people will pay out the nose for that (with the added benefit of people buying electric cars too).
- dchichkov 7y ago
  Following parts are still under a question mark: - sufficiency of compute; - software architecture; - complexity budget; - sensor suite; - datacenter. The rest seem to be done right.
warp_factor 7y ago
This comment is deeply annoying as I happen to know the self driving field. Tesla is the most hyped and least proved contender. They moved the conversation around the AI chip but that doesn't matter compared to the algorithms that runs on it! Waymo and Cruise are years in front but mask managed to hype you and make you drink koolaid in such a way that you know think they are the leaders. This is laughable.

dominotw 7y ago

> Musk couldn't care less about it's shareprice seems to be constantly tweeting about it though.

FireBeyond 7y ago

> Tesla doesn't have an advertising budget. This is an oft-repeated trope, but one look at Tesla's reports will show it's not the case. Last year, approaching $100M (I want to say certainly greater than $80M) spent on "Advertising and marketing".

zaroth 7y ago
Absolutely true. I’m sure the Referral program cost is the majority of that. They have a highly effective, modestly funded, non-traditional advertising strategy.
harry8 7y ago
I really hope the onion writers they hired are getting well paid as a part of that.

newsoul2019 7y ago

>> if identical technology emerges faster than he foresaw as was Apple when the Android ecosystem emerged Android is hardly an "identical technology". Where's the Secure Enclave? To this day, Android is too insecure and too risky for anyone to depend on.

threeseed 7y ago

1) It isn't the best AI chip in the world. And Tesla doesn't have the most advanced self driving program around. 2) I can't remember a CEO who has complained more about the stock price in particular those shorting the stock. And worst of all then go on to illegally manipulate the market to target them. 3) You have that completely backwards. Musk is the worst at solving problems with the least capital. Look at the way his manufacturing processes work or the decision to build out the Supercharger network/Gigafactory. There are definitely cheaper ways to do those. Better probably not. Cheaper yes. 4) I have worked with more Data Scientists than most and I assure you that they are just like everyone else. They care most about: company reputation, work environment, money, challenging problems etc. It's not just whether there is a great dataset or not.

curyous 7y ago
Can you name a better AI chip, especially in terms of TFLOPs per Watt?
- threeseed 7y ago
  You're moving the goalposts. It was about the best AI chip in general not based on some arbitrary efficiency number.
  - zaroth 7y ago
    TOPS per Watt is a highly meaningful metric that matters a lot in the real world. It’s a valid definition of “best”. No one cares how many TOPS your 500watt non-redundant monster can run, because it’s not being put in an EV.
    - threeseed 7y ago
      It does matter how the best AI chip performs irrespective of efficiency. Because self driving cars are a multi-year journey and those platforms will likely become more efficient.

mrep 7y ago

I've never invested in an individual stock but their full self driving tech strategy is making me highly consider going long on TSLA. I think whoever develops level 4 FSD tech that works for most Americans daily car commute is going to be a trillion dollar company. It can even require me to be in the driver's seat, not work in rain/snow, and be geofenced if it gives me at least a 5+ seconds heads up for taking over as long as it is enough time to switch context from working/whatever to drive. Think about how much time Americans spend driving for which we could free ourselves from if our cars had FSD tech that worked most of the time. If/when I have a decent commute that benefits from a car over public transportation, I would pay thousands of dollars extra for a car if it was able to free myself from driving 75% of the time. Tesla now has got hundreds of thousands of cars that people use in level 3 mode which is then used to train their L4/L5 FSD tech while also retaining all of that real world data to train their models. I don't work for self driving tech, but given the massive amount of real world data they can collect, I think they are now most likely to hit the point where they can solve basic commutes in geofenced areas with L4 over everyone else and I think people will pay out the nose for that (with the added benefit of people buying electric cars too).

dchichkov 7y ago
Following parts are still under a question mark: - sufficiency of compute; - software architecture; - complexity budget; - sensor suite; - datacenter. The rest seem to be done right.

warp_factor 7y ago

This comment is deeply annoying as I happen to know the self driving field. Tesla is the most hyped and least proved contender. They moved the conversation around the AI chip but that doesn't matter compared to the algorithms that runs on it! Waymo and Cruise are years in front but mask managed to hype you and make you drink koolaid in such a way that you know think they are the leaders. This is laughable.