Walls are starting to close in for Tesla, let's have a closer look
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Offer Tim Cook double what he is making at Apple (an obscene amount of money, but a bargain compared to Musk).
Tesla needs someone like Cook. Someone who knows supply chain management and customer service. Someone who is sane and won't alienate potential customers.
[Disclaimer: I own a Model 3. Fantastic car]
Also Tim Cook has the ability to say no and said no he did: he canned the Apple car project because he understood the risks and the costs and decided its not worth it.
If Cook were running Tesla he would likely have made the decision that one of the early activist investors tried to push: license the battery and motor tech to other companies and don't get into car building. It took someone with a nearly religious conviction like Musk to get you that Model 3 that you love so much. Where a rational person says no that kind of a person keeps going, to hell with the consequences.
Also if Tesla really was ready to unveil a major robotaxi service, wouldn’t there have been a lot of new hiring, e.g. humans for remote monitoring and servicing, like how Waymo has operators ready to take over when their taxis go awry?
I assumed we've made progress since the days of Howard Hughes' madness. I'm surprised corporate boards and wise advisors would be able to get him some help and require it actually, since he has so many responibilities but has been blowing it with drug use and erratic behavior. Is he all alone in the world or is it that he won't listen to anyway while he self-destructs?
The firing of all of the Supercharger team, in what essentially sounded like a fit of rage/spite, is so far outside the norm of what a rational person would do, even if they did think Tesla needed to make a lot of cuts. More importantly, basically all of the current scary state of Tesla can easily be laid at Musk's feet. All EV companies are struggling with reduced demand, but these decisions by Musk were obvious own goals:
1. Most importantly, Musk's incessant bad-mouthing of his biggest customers. Who does he think buys EVs more than anyone else? It's generally the "left coast chardonnay-sipping elite" that he craps on at every turn.
2. It was Musk's decision to handicap self-driving by demanding 100% reliance on cameras only.
3. Cybertruck is going to be/continue to be a disaster for Tesla. The ultimate "boy genius" plaything, Tesla could have easily doubled down on making an affordable truck or SUV but instead went for stainless steel-clad Aztec.
4. The supercharger network was Tesla's crown jewel. I've owned a couple other EVs and the other networks are (at least as of now) dismal compared to the supercharger network. And Musk just canned everyone.
The rest of those qualities seem to be fairly widespread.
Out of all the things you could pick on, this actually makes Tesla look good.
The "standard" ERP systems are steaming dogshit. They are terrible. They make everybody miserable. And they don't do a damn thing to prevent accounting fraud.
Every company I have worked for who had their own ERP system thought it was terrible ... and then SAP/Oracle came in and everybody realized that things somehow got so much worse.
> There's only so far price cuts will go. Tesla has one of the oldest lineup among automakers - with the average age of its models at 9 years (ex-Cybertruck) - Where is the innovation to spur more demand?
Tesla famously doesn't release new models by "model years" but just updates them continuously. Putting the Model S release date at June 2011 (despite that vehicle being a very different car from today's Model S), and saying that is somehow comparable to the age of other carmakers' model fleets is totally disingenuous IMO.
Do you really need to change the body design if you can keep upgrading the internals?
Personally I think it's a low-rent imitation of Mazda, so a refresh would have been nice.
For all the "but the insides have been upgraded/revamped!!" messaging, it's just confirming that they're too cheap to improve, or just change, the outside.
Also they did just update the Model 3 (looks great!) this year so they are moving in the right direction. Did you see this refreshed look on the Model 3?
But what Porsche does very well is introduce new platforms every few years. It's still a 911 but a new generation, that generates excitement and new sales. Then a few years into each cycle, it releases various sub-specialties and performance variants -- the RSes, GTs, Turbos, etc. Yes this often means at the very end of a platform's life sales drop (in anticipation of the next version) but overall its clear that Porsche has been extremely successful with this release model, which I think the other German carmakers emulate, like BMWs 3-series.
And it's obviously not just internals. Compare a 2011 Tesla (e.g. https://www.motortrend.com/news/2011-tesla-model-s-revealed-...) to a 2024 Tesla (https://www.topspeed.com/2024-tesla-model-s-overview/). Again, I think it's fine to say you think the 2024 version looks stale, but the difference between the 2011 and 2024 versions in appearance alone is at least as different as some "new models" I've seen from other car manufacturers.
Despite that, I know people who have ruled out owning a Tesla because they believe the brand mirrors Elon Musk's public persona. They flat-out reject any Tesla product because the brand's visible face is someone they believe doesn't represent their values.
I'm unsure he understood the implications of becoming such a polarizing figure. It was totally unnecessary, yet that was his choice.
Or - and this is amply documented now - perhaps the "truth" is he's doing way too many drugs (WSJ), making horrible decisions (Supercharger), and per the deeply persuasive data in the linked thread, is killing the company?
Like, huh? What?
It does not take much business acumen that taking a political stance is going to anger someone. Best keep your mouth shut unless you are prepared for the consequences.
I doubt Elon’s personal views are much different from any other billionaire CEO. Yet the majority of them are not in the spotlight and drawing attention to themselves.
Hubris made him think he was the real Tony Stark, genius playboy philanthropist bullshit, but as talented as he is in some areas, his flaws are clearly visible.
But at the end of the day, I think that if Tesla was making valuable cars, it would not matter that much. The thing is that those cars also have many flaws, and a lot of undelivered promises around self-driving...
Maybe it was the time Tony Stark praised his ideas.