I think that you'll learn that besides haters, nobody cares about the failures. Or hit rate. Only about the successes. And Elon's had such huge ones that he can keep trying for more.
He's a marketer, and a good one. A P.T. Barnum type.
They achieved something almost equivalent to the modern day Tesla before Elon contributed anything (funding excluded).
Not at all true, especially when it comes to heavy manufacturing in a very well established industry. And the vast majority of the significant R&D came after Musk took over.
You can give him credit for pulling off some amazing feats and still think he's an asshole, those aren't mutually exclusive.
I dont agree with this opinion. I think the most "significant" R&D was done by the original founders judging by their claimed timeline of how the product was developed.
We can agree to disagree.
Especially at the moment when a $20,000 battery replacement awaits Tesla owners at the 8 year mark - and in places that are primarily coal-powered, the CO2 break-even is around year 6. [1]
[1] https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/when-d...
No argument that their valuation has gotten way ahead of where they are, but the thesis is probably that it doesn’t take too many years of doublings to 10x, and companies that appear likely to decline take a significant discount to even what their current production would imply, because shareholdings are a claim on future earnings, not just where they are. Toyota really whiffed with its focus on hydrogen, frankly.
SpaceX is the first success of NewSpace, and the revolutionary cost-saving of Falcon 9 seems to continue with Starship, which is 100% reusable, unlike F9.