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14nm is a sound move for Tesla exactly because their volumes are lower. All their cars will have the new chip installed as it's part of the safety features as w

14nm is a sound move for Tesla exactly because their volumes are lower. All their cars will have the new chip installed as it's part of the safety features as well (and gives them margin whenever someone decides to do an upgrade on their existing vehicle).

hef19898 8y ago
With these low volumes the sound move would be to buy chips from someone else. Just like Aston Martin is sourcing engines from third parties. Heck, even Mercedes is using Renault engines and BMW used Peugeot engines in Minis for years. And engines are a core competency of both, BMW and Mercedes. Chips for Tesla, not so much.
- Robotbeat 8y ago
  The thing is that no one makes a chip like Tesla wants that is tailored to their workflow. Tesla, by going with the 14nm process and inexpensively licensing core IP (i.e. for the ARM cores) and only customizing the NN portion, is able to keep chip dev costs low enough so that in the end they're saving a little money on unit costs, getting a power/performance benefit, and as a bonus is building in-house expertise that enhances their value as a company. That's not a bad plan, IMHO. Also, a side note, but maybe it was a bad idea for BMW to use Peugeot engines in the Mini... I've not heard good things about them... (Which is irrelevant to the point at hand, of course.)
  - hef19898 8y ago
    Regarding the last point, not really. It gave BMW access to smaller engines then they had in-house. AFAIK they switched to BMW engines once this whole down sizing started and they had the engines in house. And MINI sales were never an issue, so the idea was sound. Aside from some potential benefits down the road coming from proprietary chips I don't see why Tesla would do it. Also the use cases are so similar that the use of in-house chips will hardly be a competitive advantage. So why burn additional cash on it if you can't afford it? Tesla, and Musk, are risking everything by loosing focus and discipline. Even at SpaceX with their in-house satellite is goeing that way now. No idea why you would do that either.
    - DennisP 8y ago
      To go to Mars, SpaceX needs lots of steady revenue and low-cost launches. The more launches SpaceX does, the lower the cost per launch, due to the manufacturing learning curve and high reusability. Rather than wait for customers to come up with applications that require lots of launches, they made their own.

hef19898 8y ago

With these low volumes the sound move would be to buy chips from someone else. Just like Aston Martin is sourcing engines from third parties. Heck, even Mercedes is using Renault engines and BMW used Peugeot engines in Minis for years. And engines are a core competency of both, BMW and Mercedes. Chips for Tesla, not so much.

Robotbeat 8y ago
The thing is that no one makes a chip like Tesla wants that is tailored to their workflow. Tesla, by going with the 14nm process and inexpensively licensing core IP (i.e. for the ARM cores) and only customizing the NN portion, is able to keep chip dev costs low enough so that in the end they're saving a little money on unit costs, getting a power/performance benefit, and as a bonus is building in-house expertise that enhances their value as a company. That's not a bad plan, IMHO. Also, a side note, but maybe it was a bad idea for BMW to use Peugeot engines in the Mini... I've not heard good things about them... (Which is irrelevant to the point at hand, of course.)
- hef19898 8y ago
  Regarding the last point, not really. It gave BMW access to smaller engines then they had in-house. AFAIK they switched to BMW engines once this whole down sizing started and they had the engines in house. And MINI sales were never an issue, so the idea was sound. Aside from some potential benefits down the road coming from proprietary chips I don't see why Tesla would do it. Also the use cases are so similar that the use of in-house chips will hardly be a competitive advantage. So why burn additional cash on it if you can't afford it? Tesla, and Musk, are risking everything by loosing focus and discipline. Even at SpaceX with their in-house satellite is goeing that way now. No idea why you would do that either.
  - DennisP 8y ago
    To go to Mars, SpaceX needs lots of steady revenue and low-cost launches. The more launches SpaceX does, the lower the cost per launch, due to the manufacturing learning curve and high reusability. Rather than wait for customers to come up with applications that require lots of launches, they made their own.