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Don’t forget GMAC - General Motors Acceptance Corp. The joke back then was that GM was a perennial money loser and only existed as a loss leader, just so GMAC c

by JackFr 5y ago

Don’t forget GMAC - General Motors Acceptance Corp. The joke back then was that GM was a perennial money loser and only existed as a loss leader, just so GMAC could make loans.

dasyatidprime 5y ago
And GMAC Bank later became Ally Bank.
dharmab 5y ago
I suspect a number of niche car and powersports brands exist in part as sales leads for financing.
skeeter2020 5y ago
Today's Toyota isn't a money-loser, but it's more of a finance company than a automaker.
- jeeeb 5y ago
  I was interested and fact checked this. Financial services are a small part of total revenue (about 1/12). They seem to be somewhat more profitable and make up about 1/4 of operating income. Fundamentally though Toyota is able to sell financial services because it sells cars. So Toyota I would say is very much a car company with a nice side hustle selling financial services. Source: https://global.toyota/pages/global_toyota/ir/financial-results/2022_1q_summary_en.pdf https://global.toyota/pages/global_toyota/ir/financial-resul... (See Supplement 2)
Spooky23 5y ago
This is happening in software too. Office 365 is functions like car insurance for business activity. The products change pretty glacially, with most enhancements focused on increasing stickiness and upsell (PowerBI). I was talking to a customer, a tax policy guru about some of the challenges with corporate taxation. My suggestion to him was to implement an excise tax on O365 and GSuite, as those products are probably more reliable metrics of business activity than payroll and other measures. Plus, Microsoft is better at compliance than most tax authorities.
- laurent92 5y ago
  I’m not sure. I mean, that would make O365/Gmail more expensive (indirectly, but cost optimizers in companies would see this as a direct cost), and I’m not sure people would pay more for them that $5/user/month. In fact, companies pay way more for SSO and videochat than for their emails…
- maxerickson 5y ago
  The pace of updates to office has accelerated with 365 though. Excel has seen lots of updates the last year or two.
  - breakfastduck 5y ago
    I actually prefer the subscription model but only for enterprise. It makes it a hell of a lot easier for the admins too, just buy a license for each user and it works. No worrying about license, needing to update to latest version etc in big jumps. Plus many people were paying for additional 'support' anyway. As a non enterprise end user, it's the worst thing in the world. Like Adobe stuff for example. I'm sure the model works fine for businesses, but it's horrific as an average user. I just want Photoshop on my pc. I dont care if its the latest version. I just need a version of it that I can buy and use and not have to budget in forever.
    - France_is_bacon 5y ago
      I still have my Adobe creative suite 4 from 2008. Works 100% fine for me. Yay, me!
    - BizarroLand 5y ago
      True. I don't want to update every day or even every week. It's annoying and I rarely see any product improvement that affects my sentiment of the software equal to the annoyance of waiting several minutes a week to use the software while it's updating. Give me an option for monthly updates and save the daily updates for product testers and people who aren't happy if they aren't running their PC on software's bleeding edge. Also, I as an individual shouldn't be expected to pay monthly for using the software that is already paid for and installed on my machine. That process should be for corporate licensing, and individuals should be able to pay once and be done with it.

by JackFr 5y ago

Don’t forget GMAC - General Motors Acceptance Corp. The joke back then was that GM was a perennial money loser and only existed as a loss leader, just so GMAC could make loans.

dasyatidprime 5y ago

And GMAC Bank later became Ally Bank.

dharmab 5y ago

I suspect a number of niche car and powersports brands exist in part as sales leads for financing.

skeeter2020 5y ago

Today's Toyota isn't a money-loser, but it's more of a finance company than a automaker.

jeeeb 5y ago
I was interested and fact checked this. Financial services are a small part of total revenue (about 1/12). They seem to be somewhat more profitable and make up about 1/4 of operating income. Fundamentally though Toyota is able to sell financial services because it sells cars. So Toyota I would say is very much a car company with a nice side hustle selling financial services. Source: https://global.toyota/pages/global_toyota/ir/financial-results/2022_1q_summary_en.pdf https://global.toyota/pages/global_toyota/ir/financial-resul... (See Supplement 2)

Spooky23 5y ago

This is happening in software too. Office 365 is functions like car insurance for business activity. The products change pretty glacially, with most enhancements focused on increasing stickiness and upsell (PowerBI). I was talking to a customer, a tax policy guru about some of the challenges with corporate taxation. My suggestion to him was to implement an excise tax on O365 and GSuite, as those products are probably more reliable metrics of business activity than payroll and other measures. Plus, Microsoft is better at compliance than most tax authorities.

laurent92 5y ago
I’m not sure. I mean, that would make O365/Gmail more expensive (indirectly, but cost optimizers in companies would see this as a direct cost), and I’m not sure people would pay more for them that $5/user/month. In fact, companies pay way more for SSO and videochat than for their emails…
maxerickson 5y ago
The pace of updates to office has accelerated with 365 though. Excel has seen lots of updates the last year or two.
- breakfastduck 5y ago
  I actually prefer the subscription model but only for enterprise. It makes it a hell of a lot easier for the admins too, just buy a license for each user and it works. No worrying about license, needing to update to latest version etc in big jumps. Plus many people were paying for additional 'support' anyway. As a non enterprise end user, it's the worst thing in the world. Like Adobe stuff for example. I'm sure the model works fine for businesses, but it's horrific as an average user. I just want Photoshop on my pc. I dont care if its the latest version. I just need a version of it that I can buy and use and not have to budget in forever.
  - France_is_bacon 5y ago
    I still have my Adobe creative suite 4 from 2008. Works 100% fine for me. Yay, me!
  - BizarroLand 5y ago
    True. I don't want to update every day or even every week. It's annoying and I rarely see any product improvement that affects my sentiment of the software equal to the annoyance of waiting several minutes a week to use the software while it's updating. Give me an option for monthly updates and save the daily updates for product testers and people who aren't happy if they aren't running their PC on software's bleeding edge. Also, I as an individual shouldn't be expected to pay monthly for using the software that is already paid for and installed on my machine. That process should be for corporate licensing, and individuals should be able to pay once and be done with it.