Comment by JumpCrisscross
18 hours ago
> never understood why Tesla valuation is orders of magnitude higher than honda
Tesla has solved the problem of unit profitably manufacturing EVs. Outside America and other petrostates, these are broadly accepted to be the future of transportation. (It’s getting its ass kicked by BYD, which didn’t distract itself with a Cybertruck or what increasingly looks like an Optimus follow-on. But being the only American challenger in a new economy is not worthless.)
Tesla’s also lead by a man who has consistently made money for his investors. Even when bets are bad, e.g. Twitter, he’s financially engineered an outcome that ensured, at the very least, nobody who backed him lost money.
Tesla being public, he can’t provide that sort of assurance to everyone who buys at any price. But he can at least credibly pretend to do that for anyone who buys in or near a primary.
> Tesla has solved the problem of unit profitably manufacturing EVs. Outside America and other petrostates, these are broadly accepted to be the future of transportation. (It’s getting its ass kicked by BYD, which didn’t distract itself with a Cybertruck or what increasingly looks like an Optimus follow-on. But being the only American challenger in a new economy is not worthless.)
They solved it by borrowing from the future and gutting their R&D. That's the main cost in the car industry and Tesla basically just stopped developing new models many years ago, to the point that they struggle with a simple refresh.
> Tesla’s also lead by a man who has consistently made money for his investors. Even when bets are bad, e.g. Twitter, he’s financially engineered an outcome that ensured, at the very least, nobody who backed him lost money.
That man also walks a very thin line between engineering outcomes and fraud, let's not forget that.
> solved it by borrowing from the future and gutting their R&D
Not relevant to unit profitability. Tesla’s American competitors can’t turn a profit on each car production-wise.
> man also walks a very thin line between engineering outcomes and fraud
Sure. But the point is to the degree investors were misled, they were made whole and then some. That’s why they keep backing him. He’s done well by them, regardless of the methods.
> Not relevant to unit profitability. Tesla’s American competitors can’t turn a profit on each car production-wise.
To quote a great commenter here, you can "engineer that outcome". While there are rules, details are mushy and as a result companies can fairly freely decide what do you include in cost per unit.
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I mean you could earn money investing in crime. Until it doesnt pay
> Tesla has solved the problem of unit profitably manufacturing EVs.
Well, you can say "profitably" because Tesla drivers seem to be surprisingly willing to put up with corners being cut in order to achieve said "profitability" ... panel gaps, cheap interiors and lousy software. :)
> you can say "profitably" because Tesla drivers seem to be surprisingly willing to put up with corners being cut in order to achieve said "profitability"
Low-end Chinese EVs feel like cheap Teslas. But they’re under $15k. Are panel gaps really worth tens of thousands of dollars to most car buyers?
That panel gap thing also is blown way out of proportion.
I challenge anyone to find a bad aligned one on a chinese made one - interestingly enough , those only seem to be a thing on US made vehicles, which basically are only Model X and Model S (ironically being the higher priced cars).
Nice to see some rational thought around here about Tesla and Musk's role.