Tesla and Uber Unlikely to Survive (Vol. 2)

[off_again]

jamoor said:

It depends if Tesla keeps innovating.

Is it me or is the market structure alarmingly similar to the smartphone market?

American Company launches new innovative product (Apple, Tesla)
Koreans get in on the bandwagon and give it a ruddy good shot. (Hyundai/kia/Samsung)
European manufacturers see where the market is heading and reactively try to release competing products (Nokia, Ericsson, BMW et al)
Chinese startups begin coming in swathes into the market (Xiaomi, Oppo, Nio etc)

IMO Tesla won't be the biggest in the future much like apple isn't the biggest smartphone maker but they do tend to set the agenda.

Good comparison and I do think that a lot of people (including the financial markets) confuse size, percentage adoption and profit to be directly related. Apple is a great example, they have something like 45% of the market in the US and that drops dramatically worldwide, but they make a TON of money off that market. You dont need to dominate a market to make a lot of money!

Transferring that to the auto industry, what I think Tesla has done is pretty much genius - start expensive, build a market and continue to sell 'premium' cars to an expanding customer base. If they can make money doing that, great. They have moved down from the $60k-$120k market, but are still expensive cars that they can sell for a premium - so all good there. Going into the sub-$30k market? Yeah, I dont think that makes a lot of sense. Let the others fight over the narrow margins and volumes - do like Apple, sell a premium product to a select buyer and make money.

Now, the real genius part would be start to license parts of their overall capability - maybe not the supercharger network, but some of the battery tech, charging processes and maybe knowledge on the whole car systems etc. They could license it out to a number of manufacturers and at that point, they can keep the latest stuff for themselves and license out the previous gen stuff - just like Mercedes AMG with Aston Martin!

[Burwood]

off_again said:

jamoor said:

It depends if Tesla keeps innovating.

Is it me or is the market structure alarmingly similar to the smartphone market?

American Company launches new innovative product (Apple, Tesla)
Koreans get in on the bandwagon and give it a ruddy good shot. (Hyundai/kia/Samsung)
European manufacturers see where the market is heading and reactively try to release competing products (Nokia, Ericsson, BMW et al)
Chinese startups begin coming in swathes into the market (Xiaomi, Oppo, Nio etc)

IMO Tesla won't be the biggest in the future much like apple isn't the biggest smartphone maker but they do tend to set the agenda.

Good comparison and I do think that a lot of people (including the financial markets) confuse size, percentage adoption and profit to be directly related. Apple is a great example, they have something like 45% of the market in the US and that drops dramatically worldwide, but they make a TON of money off that market. You dont need to dominate a market to make a lot of money!

Transferring that to the auto industry, what I think Tesla has done is pretty much genius - start expensive, build a market and continue to sell 'premium' cars to an expanding customer base. If they can make money doing that, great. They have moved down from the $60k-$120k market, but are still expensive cars that they can sell for a premium - so all good there. Going into the sub-$30k market? Yeah, I dont think that makes a lot of sense. Let the others fight over the narrow margins and volumes - do like Apple, sell a premium product to a select buyer and make money.

Now, the real genius part would be start to license parts of their overall capability - maybe not the supercharger network, but some of the battery tech, charging processes and maybe knowledge on the whole car systems etc. They could license it out to a number of manufacturers and at that point, they can keep the latest stuff for themselves and license out the previous gen stuff - just like Mercedes AMG with Aston Martin!

Anyone agree or disagree that profit is the end game? And a st tonne of it? At some time fanboys the piper wants his money. We aren’t talking about a 1 billion dollar concern here. It’s about 500b. And using Apple is a complete disservice. Apple make 50b odd in earnings.

[off_again]

jjwilde said:

JPJPJP said:

Cruise has permission to run driverless cars in San Francisco

https://uk.reuters.com/article/instant-article/idU...

This thread goes on about driverless cars as if they will never happen yet in some places you can order and use them right now (and have been able to for some time).

It's already here yet for some reason it's 'impossible' for Tesla to do it...

There is absolutely no legal framework to allow driverless cars to operate on the public highway. I have seen the Cruise cars on the streets of SF earlier this year, but with drivers in the seat. They might have received a license to operate without a driver, that does NOT mean that they have 150 cars driving around the streets of SF completely autonomously.

The California Vehicle Code absolutely does not allow you to operate a car without a driver in the seat and with suitable control of the vehicle itself. I cant find the actual code itself, but failure to keep your hands on the wheel, being distracted or similar is referred to as 'failure to maintain control' and is an offense. So a driverless car CANNOT operate on the roads. The only way you can is to join the program run by the state and provide a lot of documentation, follow recommendations and keep the relevant authorities informed at all times.

You can order a 'feature' on some cars and Tesla is going deep on this - but if you get spotted on the highway using FSD and the cops spot you, you will get pulled and ticketed. So good luck using that feature!

As for it being 'ready' - yeah, absolutely no way. There are a ton of videos showing it not working or functioning correctly. I recommend taking a look at this guys videos on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/user/ovvlog

He's very positive on it, but you can clearly see that it is far from perfect and at the moment there is no way you can trust it in real traffic. And as for Elon saying that the complete re-write being available next week? Yeah, lets see on that. He has NEVER been accurate on deadlines and unless there is a fundamental leap in capability, it is not going to work - and as for 1m Robotaxis on the roads at the end of 2020? Yeah, thats not going to happen either.

[anonymous-user]

Here’s what the article says about the permit

Cruise, which is majority owned by General Motors Co GM.N and counts Honda Motor Co Ltd 7267.T and SoftBank Group 9984.T as investors, has been testing 180 self-driving cars in San Francisco with a safety driver behind the wheel, and the permit allows five of those cars to roam empty.

So the may be 5 driverless (and passengerless i.e. empty) cruise vehicles sometime soon

Keep a look out!

[Burwood]

JPJPJP said:

Here’s what the article says about the permit

Cruise, which is majority owned by General Motors Co GM.N and counts Honda Motor Co Ltd 7267.T and SoftBank Group 9984.T as investors, has been testing 180 self-driving cars in San Francisco with a safety driver behind the wheel, and the permit allows five of those cars to roam empty.

So the may be 5 driverless (and passengerless i.e. empty) cruise vehicles sometime soon

Keep a look out!

Wow . 5 super computers doing a loop like a rat in a maze. Just incredible.

[off_again]

Burwood said:

Anyone agree or disagree that profit is the end game? And a st tonne of it? At some time fanboys the piper wants his money. We aren’t talking about a 1 billion dollar concern here. It’s about 500b. And using Apple is a complete disservice. Apple make 50b odd in earnings.

No doubt that its around profit, but hang on, confused on the numbers there.....

Ford and GM made around 150bn and 140bn last year and Apple was around 260bn.....thats revenue by the way.

Tesla made around 25bn last year in revenue. They also have debt of nearly 11bn but there are some corporate shenanigans going on there with short-term, interest, assets and so on, but this is what they declared. Anyway, its into the world of finance that I dont understand.

Not sure what you mean by 500bn there.

[Burwood]

off_again said:

Burwood said:

Anyone agree or disagree that profit is the end game? And a st tonne of it? At some time fanboys the piper wants his money. We aren’t talking about a 1 billion dollar concern here. It’s about 500b. And using Apple is a complete disservice. Apple make 50b odd in earnings.

No doubt that its around profit, but hang on, confused on the numbers there.....

Ford and GM made around 150bn and 140bn last year and Apple was around 260bn.....thats revenue by the way.

Tesla made around 25bn last year in revenue. They also have debt of nearly 11bn but there are some corporate shenanigans going on there with short-term, interest, assets and so on, but this is what they declared. Anyway, its into the world of finance that I dont understand.

Not sure what you mean by 500bn there.

Revenue not made. 500b is market value for the business. And throwing a bone to Tesla, they don’t have debts anywhere near that. They just sold more common stock for billions to cover most of that net of the convertible stock. Do you know what a convertible is

Edited by Burwood on Thursday 15th October 22:18

[off_again]

Burwood said:

Revenue not made. 500b is market value for the business. And throwing a bone to Tesla, they don’t have debts anywhere near that. They just sold more common stock for billions to cover most of that net of the convertible stock. Do you know what a convertible is

Edited by Burwood on Thursday 15th October 22:18

I know what a convertible car is.... ;-)

As for the other parts - was just working on 2019 figures and a quick Google search shows the numbers all over the shop - their valuation might be 500bn, but thats speculation for long-term. I'll credit Tesla with being clever and successful to date, but market cap of that much? Not seeing it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_public_corpo...

Not seeing Tesla in the top 10 worldwide.

[Burwood]

off_again said:

Burwood said:

Revenue not made. 500b is market value for the business. And throwing a bone to Tesla, they don’t have debts anywhere near that. They just sold more common stock for billions to cover most of that net of the convertible stock. Do you know what a convertible is

Edited by Burwood on Thursday 15th October 22:18

I know what a convertible car is.... ;-)

As for the other parts - was just working on 2019 figures and a quick Google search shows the numbers all over the shop - their valuation might be 500bn, but thats speculation for long-term. I'll credit Tesla with being clever and successful to date, but market cap of that much? Not seeing it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_public_corpo...

Not seeing Tesla in the top 10 worldwide.

Ok mate

[off_again]

JPJPJP said:

Here’s what the article says about the permit

Cruise, which is majority owned by General Motors Co GM.N and counts Honda Motor Co Ltd 7267.T and SoftBank Group 9984.T as investors, has been testing 180 self-driving cars in San Francisco with a safety driver behind the wheel, and the permit allows five of those cars to roam empty.

So the may be 5 driverless (and passengerless i.e. empty) cruise vehicles sometime soon

Keep a look out!

Not picking on you, but did the article mention where in SF? Downtown? Wider city? Or a wider California?

Trust me, driving around downtown Palo Alto (Waymo) is relatively easy with a pretty straightforward grid system. Head out to some of the newer built areas such as Mountain House and its even easier. But SF? Driving around the city itself is a nightmare - bus lanes, cycle lanes, one-way systems and nightmare drivers. And thats before you mention the almost constant road works!!!!

There was an article about Uber testing in SF with their system a couple of years ago - broke the law 5 times in the first mile and nearly ran over a cyclist..... yeah, they stopped very quickly and withdrew.

Seen Cruise, Waymo and the trucks at Moffett Field. Its impressive stuff. The Waymo Pacifica's and Lexus's are pretty good drivers, but is that the system or the driver?

[off_again]

Burwood said:

Ok mate

Not being a tit, sorry if it came across the wrong way. Just wondering what you mean? 500bn valuation for Tesla?

Oops, found it - 400bn market cap.

[anonymous-user]

off_again said:

Not picking on you, but did the article mention where in SF? Downtown? Wider city? Or a wider California?

Trust me, driving around downtown Palo Alto (Waymo) is relatively easy with a pretty straightforward grid system. Head out to some of the newer built areas such as Mountain House and its even easier. But SF? Driving around the city itself is a nightmare - bus lanes, cycle lanes, one-way systems and nightmare drivers. And thats before you mention the almost constant road works!!!!

There was an article about Uber testing in SF with their system a couple of years ago - broke the law 5 times in the first mile and nearly ran over a cyclist..... yeah, they stopped very quickly and withdrew.

Seen Cruise, Waymo and the trucks at Moffett Field. Its impressive stuff. The Waymo Pacifica's and Lexus's are pretty good drivers, but is that the system or the driver?

Don’t mind me, I’m just posting links about it. Here is the cruise ceo blog post about it

https://medium.com/cruise/its-time-to-drive-change...

I picked out one key sentence that addresses the points you raise

“it’s where over two million miles of city testing will truly hit the road for the first time: an electric car, driving by itself, navigating one of the most difficult driving cities in the world.“

[Smiljan]

To be fair that statement is similar to Musk saying there would a million robo taxis by the end of the year out earning money for their owners.

ie to be taken as a joke or with a pinch of salt

[Tuna]

Smiljan said:

To be fair that statement is similar to Musk saying there would a million robo taxis by the end of the year out earning money for their owners.

ie to be taken as a joke or with a pinch of salt

I think it's limited to 30mph, and within the city boundaries. Mobileye have demonstrated similar (if not better) capabilities.

What is subtly hidden in all these nice tech demos is the chasm between a tightly controlled experiment and the realities of delivering FSD in a meaningful manner.

By meaningful, I mean delivered in such a way that 'clients' can dramatically change the way they use cars. If it's "just" a better cruise control, that doesn't take away the technical achievement, but nor does it deliver a step change in car ownership. That would put it on par with inventions like lane assist, anti-lock brakes and four wheel drive. Sure, it improves driving, but it doesn't change the market.

To be meaningful, they have to enable use cases like robotaxis at scale, shared car ownership, ride hailing or other significant behavioural shifts. That means not only making the software robust enough to handle "general" driving (rather than strictly controlled experiments), but also solving the legislative issues and actually creating the disruptive market that the advance enables (ie. community ownership schemes, permissions to operate as a taxi, rental management systems and so on). This isn't a case of the moment a car can safely drive itself, the world will change - solving the technical problem is only part of the jigsaw puzzle.

[jjwilde]

Burwood said:

Wow . 5 super computers doing a loop like a rat in a maze. Just incredible.

Yes, but I thought it was impossible? Thought we were not going to see in for many many years etc. literally go back to a few months ago in this thread.

Goal posts moved yet again?

What now? It has to be 1000 cars driving to Alaska does it?

I think that's literally what the trolls on this thread will say, 'yeah well you might be able to get a driverless taxi anywhere in a big city but you can't get one to Alaska can you? So it's not real self driving' or some such equivalent of the 'how will I tow my fictional boat 2000 miles across europe with an EV'.

Edited by jjwilde on Friday 16th October 17:34

[Burwood]

jjwilde said:

Burwood said:

Wow . 5 super computers doing a loop like a rat in a maze. Just incredible.

Yes, but I thought it was impossible? Thought we were not going to see in for many many years etc. literally go back to a few months ago in this thread.

Goal posts moved yet again?

What now? It has to be 1000 cars driving to Alaska does it?

I think that's literally what the trolls on this thread will say, 'yeah well you might be able to get a driverless taxi anywhere in a big city but you can't get one to Alaska can you? So it's not real self driving' or some such equivalent of the 'how will I tow my fictional boat 2000 miles across europe with an EV'.

Edited by jjwilde on Friday 16th October 17:34

au contraire JJ. How exactly is a scalextric car self driving. If it's on a planned route which it can't deviate from it's not much use is it. Unless it's a shuttle, which it isn't and even if it were it's hardly a robot taxi taking over the roads. Be fair. It may be you moving the goal posts, inwards.

And i'm no troll. I'm questioning the tech

[Tuna]

jjwilde said:

Yes, but I thought it was impossible? Thought we were not going to see in for many many years etc. literally go back to a few months ago in this thread.

This is pretty much what Mobileye demonstrated a year ago. It's not the same as general purpose, publicly available FSD.

[Burwood]

Tuna said:

jjwilde said:

Yes, but I thought it was impossible? Thought we were not going to see in for many many years etc. literally go back to a few months ago in this thread.

This is pretty much what Mobileye demonstrated a year ago. It's not the same as general purpose, publicly available FSD.

As I’ve suggested before,Mobileye is ahead of the competition. And it’s level 4 and geofenced city blocks where it will be deployed starting in maybe 2 years and expanding over the decade following. Level 5 is a pipe dream. Decades away. That being driving in all conditions no pedals or wheel. It’s a complete nonsense Tesla will deploy this within 10 years. And given Mobileyes partners, it is they who will get the lions share.

[phil4]

Burwood said:

As I’ve suggested before,Mobileye is ahead of the competition. And it’s level 4 and geofenced city blocks where it will be deployed starting in maybe 2 years and expanding over the decade following. Level 5 is a pipe dream. Decades away. That being driving in all conditions no pedals or wheel. It’s a complete nonsense Tesla will deploy this within 10 years. And given Mobileyes partners, it is they who will get the lions share.

I think you're right on L5. It's just looking at how Tesla's in the UK deal with things now, makes you realise it's a long long way off. I'm not even talking about the software. The software can't currently handle roundabouts, or messy junctions very well... but I'm sure they'll get over that. I'm thinking more about how it deals with dark country roads, sun in it's eyes, condensation on the camera, that sorts of things. Yes, they're all surmountable, just like the software... but I can't see how in the UK a current Tesla with updated software stands a chance on all roads in all conditions.

[RichardM5]

phil4 said:

I think you're right on L5. It's just looking at how Tesla's in the UK deal with things now, makes you realise it's a long long way off. I'm not even talking about the software. The software can't currently handle roundabouts, or messy junctions very well... but I'm sure they'll get over that. I'm thinking more about how it deals with dark country roads, sun in it's eyes, condensation on the camera, that sorts of things. Yes, they're all surmountable, just like the software... but I can't see how in the UK a current Tesla with updated software stands a chance on all roads in all conditions.

Even on a dark dual carriageway auto pilot struggles. Come up behind a slower moving vehicle in lane 1 in the dark with nothing behind you and you can't pull out to pass as the cameras can't see anything behind you and think they are obscured. How anyone can expect this to work without installing IR so that the cameras can see in the dark is beyond me.