Comment by cma
3 years ago
At Battery investment day (a few years after Autonomy investor day) he said the opposite: that self driving wasn't worth much because competitors would follow in 2-4 years, and that their advantage was all about their new battery tech. The new Tesla-made batteries have come out now and are 20% worse energy density than Panasonic's.
I hate defending Tesla/Musk, but the reason the new batteries have worse energy density is because they switched chemistries to much cheaper, longer-lived, and safer lithium-iron-phosphate batteries.
The downside to LFP batteries is that they are less energy dense than the old NMC chemistry, though modern LFP batteries now have the same energy density as NMC batteries from about 10-15 years ago (due to the fact that individual cells can be placed more closely together than in NMC batteries due to the lack of thermal runaway risks).
Also as I understand the newer batteries doesn't have cobalt from Congo mined with child slavery. So that is a big plus.
That's not the case for their new batteries:
> Moreover, independent 4680 battery teardowns and chemistry analysis shows that Tesla is still using the regular 811 nickel-manganese-cobalt mixture for the cathodes and ordinary graphite anodes.
https://www.notebookcheck.net/First-Tesla-4680-battery-teard...
They also aren't using added-silicon anodes yet, which may explain why the energy density is so poor. I'm not sure if they are having trouble working on this, or if they are waiting on patents to expire.
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Afaik the LFP batteries Tesla uses are from CATL, their own batteries are still NCM
'Tesla founder Elon Musk said the key to his electric automaker's value is whether it can achieve self-driving technology, adding that the firm would be "worth basically zero" without it.' (https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-tesla-worth-basica...)
I guess it's a trope he trots out in different contexts.
As for batteries, you hear much the same content at a variety of different OEM "battery days", which usually get much less coverage on places like HN however.
Musk is a marketer. The keystone of any good Marketing is: "Sell What You Have." So it's Electrification. Then it's self driving. Then it's GigaPress. Then improved batteries. If Tesla ends up nailing level-5 autonomous driving, it'll be self driving again.
Steve Jobs was very good at this as well. Here's the all-new iPod! Video? Who'd want to watch video on such a small screen? Next year, the all new video iPod.
X is the key to success in the automotive industry, where X equals the trait in which Tesla has the best market position right now
Who cares about power density? They are designed to lower $/kwh not kg/kwh.
Well, you need to drive the extra weight around so it's gonna affect your mileage. Ultimately, what you should care about is $/miles of range