Should Tesla Motors be the leading or primary car manufacturer? Or should other car manufacturers step up to take a significant role in electric vehicle development, as Tesla is doing? Or should even other start-up car manufacturers participate in the undoing of the incumbent car industry? That’s a set of…
On the heels of Tesla’s quarterly financial results released earlier this week, the company notified us reservation holders of an update in our Tesla Model 3 reservation. Eagerly hoping the date had been moved up because they’re promising a 5,000/week production rate, I logged into my Tesla account and was…
A whole subsection of the International media exists to tear at Tesla Motors. That’s part of the court of public opinion, the variety of “facts” tossed around that are really interpretations of the information we all receive. This afternoon Tesla released their quarterly financial results, and we don’t have to…
Tesla Motors today announced that Tesla CEO Elon Musk had agreed to remain as CEO for at least 10 years. What was announced is the new compensation package and performance awards for Elon Musk. In industry parlance we call this kind of package “Golden Handcuffs” because the payoff is tied…
The news about Tesla Motors regularly repeats a complaint about the cash burn rate, the fact that Tesla routinely runs at a loss, is propped up by investors, and eventually the house of cards will come crashing down. There’s some truth to this – the company showed a profit in…
There have been several one or two fatalities this year of Tesla Model S drivers who were perhaps overly trusting the autopilot mode. In January 2016, well before the well-known crash in Florida, a fatality occurred when a Tesla Model S drove into the back of a street sweeper truck. Going by…
Ten years ago Elon Musk posted the first super-secret Tesla Motors master plan on the company blog. It seemed that nobody remembered he’d done so, because the company is routinely attacked over making playthings for rich people when the plan all along has been to build the Model 3 (affordable 200+ mile…
Tesla Motors just released production figures for Q2 2016 — 18,345 vehicles for a 73,380/year annualized rate. This is the Tesla Model S and Model X, both of which target the luxury car market. The company also announced projected production rate increases for 2016, and that they should (knock on…
Today Tesla Motors released its Q1 2016 quarterly financial results. Those results were eclipsed by Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s statement that Tesla Motors is speeding up the production plans. Their new goal is to hit 500,000 vehicles/year production rate by 2018, a full two years ahead of previously announced plans. The…
Today the Geek Squad and Toyota announced that Best Buy (the Geek Squad’s operators) is switching from their iconic VW Beetle’s over to Toyota Prius c’s. While this is great for Toyota and Prius sales, it strikes me that an interesting opportunity is being missed. There’s several companies offering services in…
Earlier today Tesla Motors released its Q4 2015 financial results. The company claims it has strong sales growth, and now that the Tesla Model X is in production financial results throughout 2016 will improve greatly. Since this continued growth of Tesla as a business depends on growing their car sales,…
Today Tesla Motors released their financial results for Q4 2015, and it’s a mixed bag. The company strongly emphasized strong sales growth for the Tesla Model S, claiming it is outselling the other cars in its class, and that “Cash Flow From Operations” went from hugely negative to hugely positive.…
The January 2016 plug-in electric vehicle scorecard doesn’t look too good. For example, Nissan just introduced the 2016 Leaf with great new features (more range, bigger battery pack, etc) that customers likely wanted. But its sales haven’t taken off, instead sales plunged to 755 Leaf’s for USA in Jan 2016,…
The US Department of Transportation is proposing to “Amend the Definition of 3-Wheeled Vehicles”. While the description of the Proposed Rulemaking is something I agree with, if the proposed rules had been in place 10 years ago certain aspects of the Electric Vehicle industry would have been held back. There…
This evening Faraday Future finally unveiled themselves, showing off what the company has been developing, including a massively powerful electric race car. The key is what the company calls it’s Variable Platform Architecture, which should enable the company to develop nearly any kind of four-wheeled vehicle. In other words, Faraday…
