3 ms·

Some things are hard and just throwing more money at it doesn't work because it's about company culture and leadership. Compare ICE auto industry profits since

Some things are hard and just throwing more money at it doesn't work because it's about company culture and leadership. Compare ICE auto industry profits since 2003 when Tesla was founded to money invested in Tesla till 2019 when Model Y was finished. Tesla had very less money to work with. Multiple iterations of Volkswagen's car software sucked so bad and the company culture and leadership just couldn't develop good software so Volkswagen created a separate startup style subsidiary just to make software. Guess what? That startup also failed and they recently bought a $5 billion stake in Rivian so that they could use Rivian's car software. Meanwhile their sales are tanking. Also look at SpaceX vs. ESA or Boeing/ULA with reusable boosters. Or China with EUV and chips. Even nation state level with essentially unlimited funding may not work.

tmtvl 2y ago
> Some things are hard and just throwing more money at it doesn't work because it's about company culture and leadership. Indeed, though that sword cuts both ways, if a hard problem gets fixed with lots of money being thrown at it then a competitor may be able to fix it for less if they have the right culture and leadership. > look at SpaceX vs. ESA or Boeing/ULA with reusable boosters. The way I understood it was that SpaceX was granted $3B of tax payer money to set up a moon mission and all they achieved was a single booster catch. That project is gonna go so far over budget both in terms of time and money that it's giving me a stomach ache just thinking about it.
- jiggawatts 2y ago
  A Starship plus its booster costs less than a single one of the non-reusable rocket engines of the Space Launch System... which has five engines. There's simply no comparison when it comes to cost efficiency.

3 ms·

Some things are hard and just throwing more money at it doesn't work because it's about company culture and leadership. Compare ICE auto industry profits since

by ivewonyoung 2y ago

tmtvl 2y ago
> Some things are hard and just throwing more money at it doesn't work because it's about company culture and leadership. Indeed, though that sword cuts both ways, if a hard problem gets fixed with lots of money being thrown at it then a competitor may be able to fix it for less if they have the right culture and leadership. > look at SpaceX vs. ESA or Boeing/ULA with reusable boosters. The way I understood it was that SpaceX was granted $3B of tax payer money to set up a moon mission and all they achieved was a single booster catch. That project is gonna go so far over budget both in terms of time and money that it's giving me a stomach ache just thinking about it.
- jiggawatts 2y ago
  A Starship plus its booster costs less than a single one of the non-reusable rocket engines of the Space Launch System... which has five engines. There's simply no comparison when it comes to cost efficiency.