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Only one of Elon's companies is public and there are regular calls for him to be removed, but its stock price has been on a trajectory that makes that impossibl

Only one of Elon's companies is public and there are regular calls for him to be removed, but its stock price has been on a trajectory that makes that impossible without him "canceling himself". Elon is just very good at hiring exceptionally good people to run stuff for him with a small amount of oversight and steering. Jack is CEO of two public companies and one is arguably underperforming, that's an untenable situation.

zaat 5y ago
> Elon is just very good at hiring exceptionally good people to run stuff for him with a small amount of oversight and steering Isn't this the major part of the definition of excellent manager?
- Cthulhu_ 5y ago
  Exactly. If your responsibilities are limited to calling some shots and coming up with some wild ideas here and there, and having the money to make it happen, you don't need to focus on things as much. Anyway the guy's a wreck and wrecking ball, I wouldn't be surprised if he disappears or takes a step back for a while soonish. Tesla's stonks will crash, etc.
  - datameta 5y ago
    He's gonna run his body into the ground before he even thinks about leaving SpaceX for anything else. It is his life's mission, that much is obvious to those who have seen enough candid interviews. He doesn't talk about anything else with the same level of importance.
    - samwillis 5y ago
      Same reason SpaceX won't go public if he can help it (and why Starlink is critical for a revenue stream). He needs to maintain complete control in order to put people on Mars.
      - datameta 5y ago
        Absolutely. I have no expectation of SpaceX going public this decade at the very least. Especially once Starship will start generating revenue, SpaceX may not need outside investment for a long time.
xiphias2 5y ago
Twitter is 3x in 5 years, while S&P 500 is 2x in 5 years...It's not awesome, but I wouldn't call it underperforming...it's the same growth as Facebook. Elon was kept only because he didn't give away founder control. At the end outside MBAs always try to take over and destroy the companies.
- pyrrhotech 5y ago
  Well that's a major cherry-pick. How about we use a neutral start point such as TWTR IPO date? Since Nov. 8, 2013, TWTR is up 16.8% and has paid 0 dividends. Meanwhile, SPX is up 162% since then, plus it has paid a dividend of an additional 1.5 - 2.5% per year during that time. And QQQ is up a whopping 381% in that time. Twitter has been one of the worst performers in the Nasdaq 100 over the last 8 years.
  - xiphias2 5y ago
    Sorry, It wasn't cherry picking, my main criteria was that this was the largest exact date range that I could set in Google finance, that's why I usually look at 5 year horizon:) I take back my comment, 16% is awful.
- AbsoluteNonce8 5y ago
  Not really :). 5 years is a pretty arbitrary, flattering timeline. Twitter is +18% all time growth. Facebook doubled a billion to 2B then to 3B users. In the same time span Twitter plateaud their user growth. Love the product, but the company is horrific in building things. The 3x growth is only because they finally figured out monetization 7-8 years post ipo and rode the rising Ad wave that lifted all CPMs across Snapchat and TradeDesk. Overall, pretty subpar stock and pretty grim outlook.
  - wpietri 5y ago
    What's your evidence that Twitter's market is significantly larger? Non-tech people sometimes ask me whether they should get on Twitter. I ask them why they might want it, and very often my answer is, "No, don't worry about it." And that's coming from somebody who uses Twitter enough to have two separate accounts plus a Twitter bot (sfships). Twitter, like HN, is a niche social network. [1] Twitter's niche is much larger, of course. But I don't think it makes much sense to compare it to FB, whose target market is "anybody with friends or relatives". [1] Technically, I'd call it a multi-niche network, in that it gets the most publicly active segment of people in a whole bunch of social groups. For example, tech people is has are the sort most likely to write books and articles, speak at/go to conferences, etc. But if you're the sort of workaday programmer who punches a clock at a bank and pays no attention to the industry, Twitter doesn't do much for you.

zaat 5y ago

> Elon is just very good at hiring exceptionally good people to run stuff for him with a small amount of oversight and steering Isn't this the major part of the definition of excellent manager?

Cthulhu_ 5y ago
Exactly. If your responsibilities are limited to calling some shots and coming up with some wild ideas here and there, and having the money to make it happen, you don't need to focus on things as much. Anyway the guy's a wreck and wrecking ball, I wouldn't be surprised if he disappears or takes a step back for a while soonish. Tesla's stonks will crash, etc.
- datameta 5y ago
  He's gonna run his body into the ground before he even thinks about leaving SpaceX for anything else. It is his life's mission, that much is obvious to those who have seen enough candid interviews. He doesn't talk about anything else with the same level of importance.
  - samwillis 5y ago
    Same reason SpaceX won't go public if he can help it (and why Starlink is critical for a revenue stream). He needs to maintain complete control in order to put people on Mars.
    - datameta 5y ago
      Absolutely. I have no expectation of SpaceX going public this decade at the very least. Especially once Starship will start generating revenue, SpaceX may not need outside investment for a long time.

xiphias2 5y ago

Twitter is 3x in 5 years, while S&P 500 is 2x in 5 years...It's not awesome, but I wouldn't call it underperforming...it's the same growth as Facebook. Elon was kept only because he didn't give away founder control. At the end outside MBAs always try to take over and destroy the companies.

pyrrhotech 5y ago
Well that's a major cherry-pick. How about we use a neutral start point such as TWTR IPO date? Since Nov. 8, 2013, TWTR is up 16.8% and has paid 0 dividends. Meanwhile, SPX is up 162% since then, plus it has paid a dividend of an additional 1.5 - 2.5% per year during that time. And QQQ is up a whopping 381% in that time. Twitter has been one of the worst performers in the Nasdaq 100 over the last 8 years.
- xiphias2 5y ago
  Sorry, It wasn't cherry picking, my main criteria was that this was the largest exact date range that I could set in Google finance, that's why I usually look at 5 year horizon:) I take back my comment, 16% is awful.
AbsoluteNonce8 5y ago
Not really :). 5 years is a pretty arbitrary, flattering timeline. Twitter is +18% all time growth. Facebook doubled a billion to 2B then to 3B users. In the same time span Twitter plateaud their user growth. Love the product, but the company is horrific in building things. The 3x growth is only because they finally figured out monetization 7-8 years post ipo and rode the rising Ad wave that lifted all CPMs across Snapchat and TradeDesk. Overall, pretty subpar stock and pretty grim outlook.
- wpietri 5y ago
  What's your evidence that Twitter's market is significantly larger? Non-tech people sometimes ask me whether they should get on Twitter. I ask them why they might want it, and very often my answer is, "No, don't worry about it." And that's coming from somebody who uses Twitter enough to have two separate accounts plus a Twitter bot (sfships). Twitter, like HN, is a niche social network. [1] Twitter's niche is much larger, of course. But I don't think it makes much sense to compare it to FB, whose target market is "anybody with friends or relatives". [1] Technically, I'd call it a multi-niche network, in that it gets the most publicly active segment of people in a whole bunch of social groups. For example, tech people is has are the sort most likely to write books and articles, speak at/go to conferences, etc. But if you're the sort of workaday programmer who punches a clock at a bank and pays no attention to the industry, Twitter doesn't do much for you.