Tesla, TSLA & the Investment World: the Perpetual Investors' Roundtable

[mekberg]

You're incorrect. It's actually an attempt to build in a cushion that accounts for the lunacy of everyone else on the road, including the drunk drivers, the road ragers, the unlicensed drivers, the deer and the bison, the drunk pedestrians, the sloppy construction crews, the unleashed dogs, the truck driver with product spilling off the back of his truck, etc.


Those aren't going away. Though the freeway does make some of them *much* less frequent, whch is why city streets and rural roads are so much harder.


The principle I picked up from my defensive driving courses was "Assume everyone else is a maniac and will do the stupidest, most dangerous possible thing". That's the general principle.

This is also key to surviving on a motorcycle. FWIW I sold mine after ~4 years. Too many people trying to kill me.

 

[Remus]

I don't believe we will have robo taxi service in a couple of years.

But I think it is pretty likely we will have self-driving long haul trunks restricted to highways in 4 years, enough to fire about half of the truck drivers, right in time for election 2024.

 

[NicoV]

Except for the UK, we now have complete april registration stats for Europe: 4196 cars registered (Tesla Europe Registration Stats).
If the UK has more than 265 registrations, this is the best non-third-month-of-the-quarter result ever, beating even the worst last-month-of-the-quarter of last year.

 

[oneday]

I don't believe we will have robo taxi service in a couple of years.

But I think it is pretty likely we will have self-driving long haul trunks restricted to highways in 4 years, enough to fire about half of the truck drivers, right in time for election 2024.

Enough to fire half of the truck drivers? Pass whatever your smoking this way.

 

[EVNow]

Good grief. Underestimating the competition by making ridiculous assumptions does not lead to investing success.

If anyone is interested in a non-hysterical discussion of LIDAR vs. camera only, Brad Templeton is a TSLA shareholder and Model S owner who worked on robotaxis before any of us ever heard the term. You can also access this and other articles from his excellent blog.

I just read it. Early on he states without any proof that lidar+vision gets there faster, damn the cost. The rest of the article is highly repetitive.

If you need a lot of varied data and high cost of lidar prevents you from getting that data, how is lidar+vision faster ?

 

[JRP3]

All the FSD speculation is really cluttering the thread. Unless there is a credible new announcement from Tesla or a competitor it's not investable and should be discussed elsewhere.

 

[EVNow]

Tesla’s market is global. All but three nations use metric. A non imperial measurement would be preferable.

Of course, what I meant was focussing on crashes instead of fatalities or injuries.

 

[SO16]

Elon may have another ace up his sleeve beyond FSD: The Boring Company.

Preferential access to tunnels would give Tesla Network robotaxi's a time advantage as well as a cost advantage. It's seems likely that faster rides would provide an opportunity to increase rates. Maybe something to pencil in to see how it, ah, pencils out.


That would also offer a competitive advantage, a "moat" if you will, that might extend their head start out by quite a few years.

It seems unlikely that those opposed would be able to stop all tunnels, everywhere, indefinitely. And once people see the benefits in one place, they'll want it at home.

Too bad Elon lacks the ability and experience to quickly scale up the manufacture of powerful and complicated machines like Tunnel Boring Machines. /s

I’d be surprised if any city councils that approved those tunnels, would approve this preferential treatment towards Tesla.

 

[DaveT]

I'd go so far as to say that it's likely that Apple and Google both have partnerships in the works with established automakers. I will believe those automakers can provide Apple/Google with integration to the level of Tesla when I see it and not a day before. There's simply no reason to think otherwise, as those manufacturers just don't have the capacity currently to provide such deep integration.

Volvo's been working with Google on Android Automotive for years now, for example, and what they're doing isn't as deep.

No, a partnership with an OEM that would compete with Tesla would require far more than an agreement to place a system in 'one of' their models. You'd need a fleet-wide commitment to install the system on at least tens of thousands of vehicles per month (likely far more than that so as to actually catch up to Tesla), and pretty base-level software control access to the vehicle's systems.

Basically, Google/Apple would need to be a full-on partner with the OEM, and not a simple provider of a stand-alone piece of vehicle functionality. The OEM would be effectively capitulating control of future vehicle software development to that partner, or at least would be committing to being a joint venture in perpetuity.

And for Apple/Google to effectively do this with multiple OEMs? Without epic, years-long morasses trying to standardize such systems across OEMs? Unthinkable. They'd be far better off owning the whole enchilada, which requires either starting their own OEM or buying one. Neither of which would be quick or easy.

I could certainly be wrong. Google, Apple, and Tesla all are filled with engineers far smarter and closer to this problem than I am. But it seems to me like you are trivializing the problem to an absurd degree.
.

I actually agree with a lot of what you're saying but just look at it from a different timeline.

I'm looking at it more from a 5-10 year perspective. In other words what will happen between 2024-2029.

The reason being is because I think Tesla's robotaxi network will take longer to rollout than Elon is saying. And we probably won't see anything really substantial for another 3-4 years. Sure, we might see some small rollout here or there with the rider needing to be a driver, but to rollout a true full-blown robotaxi network (w/no driver intervention at all) is a very ambitious goal that will take more than 3-4 years to roll out.

Once Tesla starts to demonstrate more FSD capacities and the humble beginnings of a robotaxi rollout, this will greatly speed up partnerships and acquisitions in the market, leading to eventual strong competitors in the 5-10 year period. Now, I'm not saying those competitors will outdo Tesla, but I am saying is that it's naive to think that Tesla isn't going to have formidable competitors in a large and lucrative market.

 

[mblakele]

All the FSD speculation is really cluttering the thread. Unless there is a credible new announcement from Tesla or a competitor it's not investable and should be discussed elsewhere.

There's a whole sub-forum for it: Autonomous Vehicles

 

[capster]

Elon may have another ace up his sleeve beyond FSD: The Boring Company.

Preferential access to tunnels would give Tesla Network robotaxi's a time advantage as well as a cost advantage. It's seems likely that faster rides would provide an opportunity to increase rates. Maybe something to pencil in to see how it, ah, pencils out.


That would also offer a competitive advantage, a "moat" if you will, that might extend their head start out by quite a few years.

It seems unlikely that those opposed would be able to stop all tunnels, everywhere, indefinitely. And once people see the benefits in one place, they'll want it at home.

Too bad Elon lacks the ability and experience to quickly scale up the manufacture of powerful and complicated machines like Tunnel Boring Machines. /s

I’d be surprised if any city councils that approved those tunnels, would approve this preferential treatment towards Tesla.

Granted, you'll prolly need to look beyond the borders of Michigan in the beginning.

Strictly speaking, it is a level playing field: The Boring Co. sells tunnels and other companies make tunnels.

Perhaps some other high volume manufacturer of electric vehicles with autonomous driving capabilities will invest in their own tunnels?

Lots of folks've been telling us for years that there will be plenty of such companies along right soon.

 

[MarcusMaximus]

I’d be surprised if any city councils that approved those tunnels, would approve this preferential treatment towards Tesla.

Well, they’re inherently preferential towards Tesla. They only allow EV’s, period, which most EV’s being Tesla’s.

 

[EVMeister]

Except for the UK, we now have complete april registration stats for Europe: 4196 cars registered (Tesla Europe Registration Stats).
If the UK has more than 265 registrations, this is the best non-third-month-of-the-quarter result ever, beating even the worst last-month-of-the-quarter of last year.

Deliveries don't start in the UK until June and ordering was only available in May. So presumably April is too early for VIN registration for the UK? Apart from a few showroom models. Not sure how that works.

 

[Thumper]

I am afraid that getting to FSD first will not help tesla as much as we think. Regulators will almost certainly wait for the pack to catch up before turning the field loose to compete. Haven't we been watching?

 

[Reciprocity]

If $200 dashcam footage is all it takes, Google already has YouTube (and street view)
This idea would create petabytes of unlabeled data with no driving control reference information. There is no driver provided feedback on the Google NN design. And even if Goggle did do this, it does not advance their fleet size at all.
This is not like airplanes which were reliant on engine HP/ weight ratios, there is no key technology that unlocks FSD for everyone.



Slowing sooner is more deceleration/ braking, stopping faster is also more deceleration/ braking. The only way to increase the following distance is more braking earlier.
If you have someone approaching you from behind quickly, you want to apply your brakes enough for the lights to come on, but you also want to stay as far away from them as possible (and flip a coin on avoiding an impact, being up against the next car at impact, or getting hit, then hitting the next car).

Google already has a system. You use it every day when you check the box that says.. I am not a robot. You then tag pictures of buses, fire hydrants, storefronts and cross walks. Your google car will never run into a fire hydrant or a store front, I can assure of that. I cannot vouch for much beyond that.

 

[EVNow]

Now, I'm not saying those competitors will outdo Tesla, but I am saying is that it's naive to think that Tesla isn't going to have formidable competitors in a large and lucrative market.

I think any investment based on the idea of monopoly in a trillion dollar industry is naive. If not technology, politics will take care of that.

 

[EVNow]

I am afraid that getting to FSD first will not help tesla as much as we think. Regulators will almost certainly wait for the pack to catch up before turning the field loose to compete. Haven't we been watching?

Florida has already approved a bill to make FSD legal. Idea that regulatory approval will come after FSD achievement doesn't seem to be correct.

 

[SO16]

Granted, you'll prolly need to look beyond the borders of Michigan in the beginning. .

Haha...true. I shouldn’t use Michigan as an example.

 

[JRP3]

Please stop with the FSD speculation. I'm reporting posts as off topic.

 

[DaveT]

Please stop with the FSD speculation. I'm reporting posts as off topic.

Didn't Elon just recently make FSD/robotaxis the main and most important part of the TSLA investment thesis? And wasn't the cap raise investor call largely about this as well? It seems like a relevant and timely topic for this thread as it has huge implications for TSLA both present and future.