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Though I agree with most of the article, the statement "you need a finely tuned, automated and hugely expensive factory". I've always seen that as a moderate f
by pedalpete 14y ago
Though I agree with most of the article, the statement "you need a finely tuned, automated and hugely expensive factory".
I've always seen that as a moderate flaw in Tesla's plan.
With the Roadster, they had essentially outsourced much of the 'car' engineering to Lotus which built the frames and many of the components for Tesla.
Just like computer companies don't manufacture computers anymore, I believe outsourcing the manufacturing of Tesla cars would have taken a large part of the financial risk off the table.
- cdash 14y agoElon seems to be really big on vertical integration. He does the same thing with SpaceX which allows him to have much lower costs by only outsourcing stuff if he absolutely has to with plans of bringing it in house in the future. You can see this also in his desire to sell these cars directly instead of working through dealerships that is currently causing some legal battles.
- secabeen 14y agoThe risk of outsourcing is that there aren't a lot of suppliers who can build the parts they need. If they outsource key components, they can get into a situation where the supplier can name a punitive price for parts.