Comment by justapassenger
4 years ago
Musk has history of building and shipping products, yes.
But he's also no stranger to fraud, lies and defrauding investors. Solar roof is best example of that ([1] and [2] talk about it, but there's more stories about it).
Solar roof was 100% fake product, that was shown only to justify fraudulently bailing out his other insolvent business. Years later, Tesla still doesn't have solar roof product (they do some solar roof installation, of roof made by Changzhou Almaden, Chinese company [3]).
[1] https://ftalphaville.ft.com/2019/08/28/1566985766000/The-gre...
[2] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/09/solarcity-was-in...
[3] https://www.pv-tech.org/news/changzhou-almaden-supplying-tes...
Tesla buying Solar City was put to a shareholder vote (I voted yes along with the majority). Those shareholders should be happy now with the outcome of letting Musk do what he wants.
I'm not convinced any of this rises to fraud and none of it is close to what Nikola is doing here.
The solar roof also does exist and they install it, I'm not sure how that's fraud? https://www.tesla.com/solarroof because they buy parts from China?
> Tesla buying Solar City was put to a shareholder vote (I voted yes along with the majority).
Elon staged fake product presentation a month before the vote to gain support for the acquisition [1].
> Those shareholders should be happy now with the outcome of letting Musk do what he wants. > I'm not convinced any of this rises to fraud and none of it is close to what Nikola is doing here.
It's not a fraud because it worked? Same as Nikola - if they end up delivering some products in the end and their stock will keep on going up, then they it doesn't matter that they lie now?
> The solar roof also does exist and they install it, I'm not sure how that's fraud? https://www.tesla.com/solarroof because they buy parts from China?
Tesla still doesn't produce any type of solar roof, that was suppose to be their huge technological advantage. It's same as if Nikola instead of producing their vehicles will become dealership for Nissan Leaf.
Main difference between Nikola and Tesla now is that Tesla did deliver some products so far, but both companies are using hype and lies to gather funds and generate more hype. Given how much founding Nikola gathered so far, unless the whole EV bubble explodes, they'll also likely deliver some products.
[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2019/10/28/musk-deposition-stockholders...
> Elon staged fake product presentation a month before the vote to gain support for the acquisition.
> It's not a fraud because it worked?
It's not fraud because I don't buy your claim that it was a fake product presentation solely to gain acquisition support and the article you link doesn't even support that.
> Main difference between Nikola and Tesla now is that Tesla did deliver some products so far
"Some products" - they've sold hundreds of thousands of cars, built out a supercharging network, and a battery factory, while also making progress on autonomous driving at the same time. They were the first to prove this market against enormous odds and constant negative press.
Nikola has produced nothing but bullshit. I think the Tesla stock is crazy right now and I also think Elon's timelines are often unrealistic, but the amount of anti-elon anti-tesla sentiment in the face of success after success against enormous odds is wild to me.
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You don't need to manufacture a product to sell it. He might have been developing it, then someone beat him to it. Instead of spending on R&D, he gets to just buy it from a manufacturer and use his name to sell thousands.
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> Solar roof was 100% fake product
They have a number of installations in California that were done for real clients and are fully functional. It may not be viable or scalable, but it is absolutely not fake. It is an actual product that works.
What they install now is Chinese solar roof. What they Elon showed during presentation was 100% fake.
"Still, the company does acknowledge that the demos Musk unveiled at Universal Studios were not functional"
(https://www.fastcompany.com/40422084/inside-steel-pulse-the-...)
Not yet manufactured doesn't is not the same as fake.
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Jeez, what will it take to convince the Musk haters that he's the real deal? I mean, what does a guy have to do to prove it? Launch his car into Mars orbit using his own rocket? Oh wait....
You misread your third link. They supply the passive non-solar glass tiles, not the solar tiles. The solar tiles are manufactured in Boston.