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Even the name screams transparent fraud, a ridiculously obvious attempt to associate with Tesla. Weren't there VCs who put money into this? What were they thin

by api 5y ago

Even the name screams transparent fraud, a ridiculously obvious attempt to associate with Tesla. Weren't there VCs who put money into this? What were they thinking? Were they being amoral and hoping to ride this pump and dump or did they actually buy into this shit?

mikestew 5y ago
My first thought when hearing of the company was the J. T. Marlin "brokerage" from the movie Boiler Room. And for those viewers that didn't get the joke, the movie helpfully provides a scene where other brokers in a bar make fun of the uncanny resemblance to "J. P. Morgan". Bonus point for the ethical similarities between J. T. Marlin and Nikola.
- twelve40 5y ago
  This Nikola thing looks pretty weird indeed, but to be fair, Musk's name for his company is also not very original, since he (or whoever) also just took the dude's name even though he had absolutely nothing to do with him.
  - lordnacho 5y ago
    I thought Musk joined after it had been founded? Did he change the name?
    - Sebguer 5y ago
      No, Musk had literally nothing to do with the name, just a continuation of his myth as anything more than a guy with a lot of money.
      - ineedasername 5y ago
        a guy with a lot of money Well, in the words of Batman when asked about his superpower, "I'm rich".
      - vlunkr 5y ago
        Is it really a significant part of his myth that he named the company?
        deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
        Sebguer 5y ago
        I didn't say it was significant! Though, being considered a 'co-founder' of Tesla was important enough to him to sue the actual founders.
      - sebzim4500 5y ago
        I think Bezos has demonstrated quite convincingly that simply having a lot of money does not mean you can compete with SpaceX. Similarly, I don't know much about the automotive industry, but turning a company with a few employees into one of the most valuable companies in the world is not easy, even if you have $100 million to play with at the start. It's OK to simultaneously believe that "Elon Musk is very effective at growing engineering businesses to the point that they disrupt entire industries" and also that "Elon Musk is not as smart as he thinks he is, and his tweets are embarrassing".
      - tim333 5y ago
        He started as a guy without money and got to briefly be the guy with the most money which is not so easy to do.
        orestarod 5y ago
        Are you sure he had no money? Was he born in a low or middle-class family?
    - twelve40 5y ago
      "Tesla almost had a very different name—until Elon Musk and his co-founders bought the rights to “Tesla” for $75,000" https://fortune.com/2018/12/09/tesla-name-faraday-elon-musk/ https://fortune.com/2018/12/09/tesla-name-faraday-elon-musk/
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - majormajor 5y ago
    Tesla's name is somewhat original because the connection between electricty and Tesla is certainly obvious and understandable, yet also rare enough in the US compared to Edison that it wasn't already taken. A second company then copying exactly the same association? Different thing entirely.
    - You-Are-Right 5y ago
      Not original: https://www.tesla.cz/en/history/ https://www.tesla.cz/en/history/
    - Sanzig 5y ago
      It's also name for the SI unit of magnetic flux density, which fits with the electric motor theme.
  - mcot2 5y ago
    Tesla invented the AC motor which was used in the first roadster so thats why they named it that. Very logical…
    - myself248 5y ago
      And I remember around the time Tesla-the-car-company first emerged, rolling my eyes at the name. Like "Oh here we go, another EV startup using the guy's name without permission because his estate isn't set up to sue anyone who speaks it the way Edison's is. Best we can hope for is they do something cool and don't dishonor his legacy." There are times I'm glad to have misjudged someone.
  - nonfamous 5y ago
    Tesla is also an SI unit associated with electricity. Then again, are there any companies called "Ohm" or "Ampere"?
    - IlliOnato 5y ago
      https://ampere.shop https://ampere.shop
    - pacificmint 5y ago
      Not the company name, but the Chevy Volt was sold as the Ampera in Europe.
    - haneefmubarak 5y ago
      There's a computing startup founded by ex-Intel folks named Ampere
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
- dannylandau 5y ago
  Generally don't comment on sub-posts, but Boiler Room is a great movie! And very apropo to the current market stock/crypto craze going on right now.
SV_BubbleTime 5y ago
> Weren't there VCs who put money into this? Definitely, but worse than that, real companies that really should have known better. GM associated themselves. For what reason I can’t figure out. It must have been high up because the GM engineers I know all knew it was a 100% scam. It’s like anything else that confuses me in business. Some idiot made a mistake, sure, but then their boss approved that, and all the other people required approved it, and at no point did anyone say “Hey, wait, no, stop”.
- yup00 5y ago
  I read an article, over a year ago now, that said the GM deal was nothing but upside for GM They got cash from Nikola whether they ended up manufacturing anything for them or not, and had to put up nothing up front.
  - dasudasu 5y ago
    Reputational hit from propping up literal fraud. Opportunity cost from not partnering with better companies in the space.
    - yup00 5y ago
      GM’s reputation is trash with anyone but patriotic “GM/Chevy” Americans already. So long as the public are willing to believe they’re essential, they’ll remain too big to fail and don’t need to worry about their reputation.
- mcot2 5y ago
  One of the NKLA board members Steve Girsky was previously a Vice Chairmen at GM and likely facilitated this deal. I think it needs to be investigated further and Mary Barra should be forced to provide the evidence of due dilligence that GM collected during the closing of the deal.
  - bell-cot 5y ago
    What due diligence is reasonably required of GM, if the deal is obviously a win or wash for them, no matter what happens at NKLA?
H8crilA 5y ago
Just "Copying Tesla" is not a fraud by a mile, the whole point of capitalism is that enterprises compete by offering alternative solutions[1]. It is actually surprising it took so long for someone to copy the "electric car company with Tesla characteristics", given the insanely attractive cost of equity capital that Tesla is enjoying. Matt Levine wrote a section on this, about how Elon said good-bye to earnings calls since his funding is coming mostly from retail investors, to whom he speaks via Twitter and memes, they don't listen to the call anyhow so why bother :) https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-07-27/matt-levine-s-money-stuff-lordstown-is-selling-some-stock https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-07-27/matt-l... [1] Well unless (unless! unless!) it eventually turns out that Tesla is a fraud and you're copying that too.
- mcot2 5y ago
  Whatever you think of them, the Tesla fanboys have been proven more right then wrong and the likes of Matt Levine (and Bloomberg) are just bitter at this point. A lot of EV startups like NKLA are going to come and go but very few if any will be able to replicate Teslas success in the long term. Retail investors are not always stupid, many of the same Tesla investors have been shorting NKLA since it came on via a spac offering. Personally I don’t always love everything Elon does but I view him in many ways as a modern day Edison. It’s always funny to me to go back and read stuff said about Edison while he was alive. I very much color my view of Musk by historical perspective and try not to get lost in present day minutia.
  - ineedasername 5y ago
    and the likes of Matt Levine (and Bloomberg) are just bitter Matt Levine has also struck me as more amused-- and perhaps confused-- than bitter about this.
    - unyttigfjelltol 5y ago
      Matt writes brilliantly on irrational, ridiculous, silly happenings in the world of finance. My guess is he's happy for a such a steady stream of subject matter.
itsoktocry 5y ago
>a ridiculously obvious attempt to associate with Tesla. Nikola was building barely functional prototypes of their trucks years before Tesla was building barely functional Semi truck prototypes, for the record. >What were they thinking? Were they being amoral and hoping to ride this pump and dump or did they actually buy into this shit? Fundamentally, what have they done that's so evil compared to, say, the multitude of things Tesla has claimed over the past few years? For example, Tesla claimed door-to-door cross country self-driving tests, oh, about 5 years ago. At what point is it aspiration versus indictable fraud?
- admax88q 5y ago
  Well... Tesla actually sells real cars. Nikola so far looks little different than your average kickstarter that never delivers.
  - itsoktocry 5y ago
    >Well... Tesla actually sells real cars. So if you sell cars and land rockets, you can lie about other things?
    - lazide 5y ago
      Hopefully not - but at least you’d not be 100% fraudulent, unlike the lovely subject of this posting.
- rberg 5y ago
  > Nikola was building barely functional prototypes of their trucks years before Tesla was building barely functional Semi truck prototypes, for the record. If by "barely functional" you mean a metal skeleton on wheels that rolled down hills, then yes. I'm not a shill for Tesla as they definitely have made very questionable claims in the past, but to claim that Nikola's semi is in any way similar to Tesla is a bit of a stretch.
  - mcot2 5y ago

by api 5y ago

mikestew 5y ago

My first thought when hearing of the company was the J. T. Marlin "brokerage" from the movie Boiler Room. And for those viewers that didn't get the joke, the movie helpfully provides a scene where other brokers in a bar make fun of the uncanny resemblance to "J. P. Morgan". Bonus point for the ethical similarities between J. T. Marlin and Nikola.

twelve40 5y ago
This Nikola thing looks pretty weird indeed, but to be fair, Musk's name for his company is also not very original, since he (or whoever) also just took the dude's name even though he had absolutely nothing to do with him.
- lordnacho 5y ago
  I thought Musk joined after it had been founded? Did he change the name?
  - Sebguer 5y ago
    No, Musk had literally nothing to do with the name, just a continuation of his myth as anything more than a guy with a lot of money.
    - ineedasername 5y ago
      a guy with a lot of money Well, in the words of Batman when asked about his superpower, "I'm rich".
    - vlunkr 5y ago
      Is it really a significant part of his myth that he named the company?
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - Sebguer 5y ago
        I didn't say it was significant! Though, being considered a 'co-founder' of Tesla was important enough to him to sue the actual founders.
    - sebzim4500 5y ago
      I think Bezos has demonstrated quite convincingly that simply having a lot of money does not mean you can compete with SpaceX. Similarly, I don't know much about the automotive industry, but turning a company with a few employees into one of the most valuable companies in the world is not easy, even if you have $100 million to play with at the start. It's OK to simultaneously believe that "Elon Musk is very effective at growing engineering businesses to the point that they disrupt entire industries" and also that "Elon Musk is not as smart as he thinks he is, and his tweets are embarrassing".
    - tim333 5y ago
      He started as a guy without money and got to briefly be the guy with the most money which is not so easy to do.
      - orestarod 5y ago
        Are you sure he had no money? Was he born in a low or middle-class family?
  - twelve40 5y ago
    "Tesla almost had a very different name—until Elon Musk and his co-founders bought the rights to “Tesla” for $75,000" https://fortune.com/2018/12/09/tesla-name-faraday-elon-musk/ https://fortune.com/2018/12/09/tesla-name-faraday-elon-musk/
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- majormajor 5y ago
  Tesla's name is somewhat original because the connection between electricty and Tesla is certainly obvious and understandable, yet also rare enough in the US compared to Edison that it wasn't already taken. A second company then copying exactly the same association? Different thing entirely.
  - You-Are-Right 5y ago
    Not original: https://www.tesla.cz/en/history/ https://www.tesla.cz/en/history/
  - Sanzig 5y ago
    It's also name for the SI unit of magnetic flux density, which fits with the electric motor theme.
- mcot2 5y ago
  Tesla invented the AC motor which was used in the first roadster so thats why they named it that. Very logical…
  - myself248 5y ago
    And I remember around the time Tesla-the-car-company first emerged, rolling my eyes at the name. Like "Oh here we go, another EV startup using the guy's name without permission because his estate isn't set up to sue anyone who speaks it the way Edison's is. Best we can hope for is they do something cool and don't dishonor his legacy." There are times I'm glad to have misjudged someone.
- nonfamous 5y ago
  Tesla is also an SI unit associated with electricity. Then again, are there any companies called "Ohm" or "Ampere"?
  - IlliOnato 5y ago
    https://ampere.shop https://ampere.shop
  - pacificmint 5y ago
    Not the company name, but the Chevy Volt was sold as the Ampera in Europe.
  - haneefmubarak 5y ago
    There's a computing startup founded by ex-Intel folks named Ampere
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
dannylandau 5y ago
Generally don't comment on sub-posts, but Boiler Room is a great movie! And very apropo to the current market stock/crypto craze going on right now.

SV_BubbleTime 5y ago

> Weren't there VCs who put money into this? Definitely, but worse than that, real companies that really should have known better. GM associated themselves. For what reason I can’t figure out. It must have been high up because the GM engineers I know all knew it was a 100% scam. It’s like anything else that confuses me in business. Some idiot made a mistake, sure, but then their boss approved that, and all the other people required approved it, and at no point did anyone say “Hey, wait, no, stop”.

yup00 5y ago
I read an article, over a year ago now, that said the GM deal was nothing but upside for GM They got cash from Nikola whether they ended up manufacturing anything for them or not, and had to put up nothing up front.
- dasudasu 5y ago
  Reputational hit from propping up literal fraud. Opportunity cost from not partnering with better companies in the space.
  - yup00 5y ago
    GM’s reputation is trash with anyone but patriotic “GM/Chevy” Americans already. So long as the public are willing to believe they’re essential, they’ll remain too big to fail and don’t need to worry about their reputation.
mcot2 5y ago
One of the NKLA board members Steve Girsky was previously a Vice Chairmen at GM and likely facilitated this deal. I think it needs to be investigated further and Mary Barra should be forced to provide the evidence of due dilligence that GM collected during the closing of the deal.
- bell-cot 5y ago
  What due diligence is reasonably required of GM, if the deal is obviously a win or wash for them, no matter what happens at NKLA?

H8crilA 5y ago

Just "Copying Tesla" is not a fraud by a mile, the whole point of capitalism is that enterprises compete by offering alternative solutions[1]. It is actually surprising it took so long for someone to copy the "electric car company with Tesla characteristics", given the insanely attractive cost of equity capital that Tesla is enjoying. Matt Levine wrote a section on this, about how Elon said good-bye to earnings calls since his funding is coming mostly from retail investors, to whom he speaks via Twitter and memes, they don't listen to the call anyhow so why bother :) https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-07-27/matt-levine-s-money-stuff-lordstown-is-selling-some-stock https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-07-27/matt-l... [1] Well unless (unless! unless!) it eventually turns out that Tesla is a fraud and you're copying that too.

mcot2 5y ago
Whatever you think of them, the Tesla fanboys have been proven more right then wrong and the likes of Matt Levine (and Bloomberg) are just bitter at this point. A lot of EV startups like NKLA are going to come and go but very few if any will be able to replicate Teslas success in the long term. Retail investors are not always stupid, many of the same Tesla investors have been shorting NKLA since it came on via a spac offering. Personally I don’t always love everything Elon does but I view him in many ways as a modern day Edison. It’s always funny to me to go back and read stuff said about Edison while he was alive. I very much color my view of Musk by historical perspective and try not to get lost in present day minutia.
- ineedasername 5y ago
  and the likes of Matt Levine (and Bloomberg) are just bitter Matt Levine has also struck me as more amused-- and perhaps confused-- than bitter about this.
  - unyttigfjelltol 5y ago
    Matt writes brilliantly on irrational, ridiculous, silly happenings in the world of finance. My guess is he's happy for a such a steady stream of subject matter.

itsoktocry 5y ago

>a ridiculously obvious attempt to associate with Tesla. Nikola was building barely functional prototypes of their trucks years before Tesla was building barely functional Semi truck prototypes, for the record. >What were they thinking? Were they being amoral and hoping to ride this pump and dump or did they actually buy into this shit? Fundamentally, what have they done that's so evil compared to, say, the multitude of things Tesla has claimed over the past few years? For example, Tesla claimed door-to-door cross country self-driving tests, oh, about 5 years ago. At what point is it aspiration versus indictable fraud?

admax88q 5y ago
Well... Tesla actually sells real cars. Nikola so far looks little different than your average kickstarter that never delivers.
- itsoktocry 5y ago
  >Well... Tesla actually sells real cars. So if you sell cars and land rockets, you can lie about other things?
  - lazide 5y ago
    Hopefully not - but at least you’d not be 100% fraudulent, unlike the lovely subject of this posting.
rberg 5y ago
> Nikola was building barely functional prototypes of their trucks years before Tesla was building barely functional Semi truck prototypes, for the record. If by "barely functional" you mean a metal skeleton on wheels that rolled down hills, then yes. I'm not a shill for Tesla as they definitely have made very questionable claims in the past, but to claim that Nikola's semi is in any way similar to Tesla is a bit of a stretch.
- mcot2 5y ago