Elon Musk is working on a new master plan for Tesla.
Elon Musk's new master plan includes scaling Tesla to 'extreme size'
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| You're thinking big. He's thinking extremely big. Credit: Picture Alliance / Getty Images |
In 2006, Elon Musk revealed his "master plan" for Tesla, a long-term strategy on how the Tesla CEO envisions the company developing over the next decade or so. Roughly 10 years later, he revealed the second part of the master plan. And now, another five years on, he's working on the third instalment.
This third part of Musk's master plan hasn't yet been revealed in full, but on Monday, he shared some hints on what it will look like.
"Main Tesla subjects will be scaling to extreme size, which is needed to shift humanity away from fossil fuels, and AI," tweeted Musk. "But I will also Include sections about SpaceX, Tesla and The Boring Company."
Musk's master plan for Tesla might sound gimmicky but it's worth paying attention to, given that the first (arguably extremely ambitious) part of the master plan has largely become reality
Here's a refresher. In his original master plan, Musk said Tesla's strategy was to start by building a sports car (the original Tesla Roadster), then use the money to build an affordable car (that was the Model S), then use that money to build an even more affordable car (that was the Model 3). The execution hit a few speed bumps along the way — remember Tesla's "production hell" and Model 3 delays? — but Tesla ultimately pulled it off.
The second part of the master plan hasn't gone that well. It included launching a Tesla Semi truck (in production, but not available yet), a Solar Roof (available but with long wait times), and building a fleet of fully autonomous vehicles (not there yet).
One thing that has been going well, however, is sales of currently available Tesla models, and it appears that Musk plans to leverage that success to scale the company to "extreme size." Tesla is already growing pretty fast — the company's massive Texas Gigafactory is ramping up volume, and it's about to start production on its first Gigafactory in Europe soon — but the company previously said it plans to produce 20 million cars annually by 2030, so that may be the "extreme" size Musk is referring to.
Also, as Electrek points out, Musk mentioning his other companies, including SpaceX and The Boring Company, might indicate that he's planning to round them all up under one big umbrella company, such as Alphabet or Meta.
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why don‘t we go back and think about the full product life cycle and those negative externalities. that‘d be great.
ReplyDeleteWhat Musk needs is not an expansion of operations, but an expansion of range of products that competes against the cheapest and most common cars out there, both in price and quality. If he can supply THAT, then people would rather buy that than the toyota corolla or hyundai gets or whatever other vehicle they were gonna get for price and reliability. Making fancier vehicles will not do as much as competing with the most popular car out there.
ReplyDeleteWhy? Maybe for the American market. There are not enough parking spots even for SUV's in many cities in Europe
Deletelower $ cars don't carry as much profit margin. They will get there eventually
DeleteWhy? Maybe for the American market. There are not enough parking spots even for SUV's in many cities in Europe
ReplyDeleteIncluding Neuralink too?
ReplyDeleteTesla will have to be able to produce a lot more cars as companies like Stellantis and General Motors go out of business.
ReplyDeleteGeneral Motors won’t be going out of
ReplyDeletebusiness anytime soon.
General Motors is only slightly behind Tesla on the growth curve. Having already announced, and breaking ground on every upcoming factory to ramp up, and produce more affordable electric vehicles than Tesla sells. For example, Chevy Equinox will start at $30K, vs the Model Y currently @ 63k. Even the Chevy Blazer EV will cost less than the Model Y, and probably achieve just as much range on a charge.
This is no longer about a manufacturer having a proprietary charging network for their vehicles, as it is about reaching a mass affordable car, and letting consumers choose where they charge their vehicles, and assisting them with that through in-car technology or apps on their smartphone. States have 10yrs to submit their plans for rolling out a statewide DCFC infrastructure plan, and some states have already acted on it.
Tesla has yet to even release their CCS adapter for their own vehicles in North America. The supercharger network is superior for Tesla owners being the only network that owners can rely on for compatibility. That’s the only advantage for Tesla. As EA and EVGo rollout support for CCS and Tesla over CHademo, it’s a win-win for all other manufacturers, and consumers.
General Motors is only slightly behind Tesla on the growth curve.
DeleteYou cannot possibly be serious.
The supercharger network is a huge advantage, but not Tesla's "only advantage." Tesla has the technology to make batteries that won't spontaneously ignite, unlike the Bolt's. Also, Tesla has the technology to manufacture batteries at a cost that allows Tesla to make a profit. That remains to be seen from GM. Tesla has a superior motor, voltage regulator, and thermal regulation system.
ReplyDeleteStrangely, none of our 3 EV's has spontaneously ignited even though we never had a Tesla.
DeleteThe more EV's the better regardless of brand, wouldn't you agree ?
For some of us, the supercharger network has no advantage as we can easily plug in at home every night and don't plan to take road trips with our BEV. As for batteries, other manufacturers are doing fine. Tesla makes a good product but they aren't the only good product any more.
DeleteYou think consumers are going to care about that? They care about range and overall lifespan longevity.
DeleteThe top criteria is price. Right now Tesla sells in the Luxury market and is doing just fine. Down the road, they will produce a lower priced car, but they are in no rush at this time with the demand far out stripping supply. The range and lifespan are important, but Tesla leads in that category too if you compare using efficiency for range and history for longevity. No contest.
DeleteAnd whether the dealer serves fresh coffee while they wait for their oil change.
DeleteThe supercharger network is superior for Tesla owners being the only network that owners can rely on for compatibility.
ReplyDeleteThat's a misrepresentation of facts.
The Supercharger Network is superior because it is the only network that really enables long distance travel, not because of "compatibility".
This poster wants you to believe that the Supercharger Network puts Tesla owners at some kind of a disadvantage. In reality, if there is the slightest chance you will ever want to make a long distance trip, you need to buy a Tesla.
I assume that could be right for the USA.
DeleteNot so much where I live :)
Writes, "General Motors go out of business." More likely file for bankruptcy again (June 2009). Motor vehicle companies selling
ReplyDeletefossil fuel burning vehicles certainly have their hands full as far more efficient EVs (like by E-Bike) gain momentum.That being said, my Nephew, Sister-in-law and brother own Teslas and say they're shabbily built.
The loser isn't GM it will be all the auto-repair shops that as the public across the USA stop driving as much will stretch the average lifespan of their gas cars; but less repairs as they need less maintenance. (I.e., I just went from 12K-15K miles a year to 3-4K miles a year.). Selling my second gas car and putting that money in a fund that will be used maybe to get an EV in the next 10 years. As GM and others power up, along with the downsizing of repair shops, watching behaviors of consumers; I believe the tipping point is <30K EV or personally I would like to see another "Prius" type hybrid come online as a interim possibility to remove only gas cars from the road. Where the industry is failing as a total is not recognizing the consumers not trusting a EV. There is a huge segment that will never make the jump from gas to EV (my opinion) but will to "hybrid" and provide an assist with gas issues. GM/Ford are like a good NBA team. 12 deep and always re-tuning.
ReplyDeleteScaling to extreme size is a hint about the fact Tesla has been holding off on announcements about the next round of GF locations until Berlin and Austin are operational. We can expect 4 new GF projects as well as expansions of existing GFs - but details probably one at a time. Getting from 2M to 20M vehicles per year in 8 years and all of those FSD - fully autonomous is critical. Another round of 8 more GF locations needed after 2025. Places that want to attract a GF will have opportunities.
ReplyDeleteAn order of magnitude of orders of magnitudes?
ReplyDeleteWhats next for telsa? How about getting rid of all the FSD $$ bull crapp and making a car for a market besides the luxury market.
ReplyDeletemake affordable cars for the Rest of the people.
As long as this keeps the Wall Street anal-ists happy and sends stock price back up to 1200, it's fine.
ReplyDeleteSpace X and Boring clearly need funding and Elon doesn't want to lose control of them...
ReplyDeleteBoth are being funded by ongoing operations. New contracts for both and then there is Starlink. Once Starship is flying, Starlink will grow rapidly as will revenue. Tesla will not be relied upon to finance SpaceX or TBC...clearly.
DeleteUmbrella corporation? :D
ReplyDelete20 million is a lofty goal, that would make it about 1/5th of global demand for new cars, and ICE will be retiring which may in fact increase replacement demand. Frankly its a good idea but in my experience Elon has a short attention span. That said he should have strategists and capital working for him so its not like he is building 20 million cars with his own bare hands.
We should also not forget Powerwalls, Powerpacks and Megapacks.
I continue to believe that standard lithium ion should be used for transportation only since there are supply issues and you don't need lightweight for stationary applications. That said Tesla's business model is lithium ion (and in China lithium phosphate). But we should be looking for lower cost, easier to scale alternatives for fixed location energy storage.
Has a short attention span, or gives attention to more things than seem reasonable to the rest of us? He's been working at Tesla for almost two decades? More than that for SpaceX.
DeleteThen boring company and now robots.
DeleteWe can argue till we are blue in the face that you can use new projects in conjunction with present projects but in the end Elon likes stretching himself thinner.
Could space x plus hyperloop add long and mid distance travel to the every day distance from the car company?
ReplyDeleteAI and bots is a whole other matter, as we know the singularity where machine intelligence exceeds human is near and once that tipping point is reached will explode exponentially. Musk is not a denier on this so I have no idea how he sees it relating to plans like mass production for human customers....
So far, his part two plans aren't in effect, no Semi and no CT. The worn excuse of 4680 manufacturing ramp up is old and still no Semi and no CT. The question to answer is "when" will 4680 become mass manufactured for the new pack design. At some point this may well be used in the TESLA solar PV and energy storage business. The didactic of "multi-tasking" is a common claim but a false narrative. "Multi-tasking" is no more than a job done "half-right" by bouncing back and forth between this job and other jobs in the queue.
ReplyDelete"So far, his part two plans aren't in effect, no Semi and no CT."
DeleteMaybe because the factory that is destined to do that is just getting finished? And the 4680s are going into the new generation Model Y so I don't know why you think this is all still a problem. There are people like Elon who make things happen, and then the rest (the majority) who wonder what did happen.
Or those who spend their time criticizing others and complaining on social media. Now a sizeable portion of the US population.
DeleteNeither is full autonomy, but all these things that critics deemed impossible are making steady progress toward being fulfilled. Impossible things do seem to take Elon and Tesla a little longer than they originally guess.
ReplyDeleteRemember when it was impossible to land an orbital class booster? Remember when if it did land it would never be reused? And if it was reused it would not past 10 launches? A booster just launched and landed for the 12th time over the weekend. Eat it, lame critics.
DeleteYea!! Hard stuff they solve fast, impossible might take them a while ;P
Delete"The worn excuse of 4680 manufacturing ramp up is old and still no Semi and no CT"
ReplyDeleteWe didn't learn about the 4680 cell format until 9 months after the original production date for the Semi had slipped and that was 3 years after the Semi reveal event.
So just how long had the internal production plan been dependent on a new cell format & a new type of battery pack?
Who cares for reality. They made some claims (probably with 2 figures after the decimal point) and a few years later found out that just Musk still didn't change reality in the end. So they needed to find ways to make those claims at least partially possible. And they still couldn't do it.
ReplyDeleteYes. How dare them not to deliver on time the fastest production car ever made that happens to be a 4 door sedan, or to land rockets and re-use them upending the rocket industry or having record sales and profits in pandemic years with extreme supply issues! All years later than planned..
DeleteShame on them, completely unreliable...
'this isn't mission difficult, it's mission impossible. "Difficult" should be a walk in the park'
DeleteOh look, they did some things, so not doing other things doesn't matter.
Delete4680 was the wrong bet. 4680 is fine for the Semi or Roadster, but Tesla needs their own LFP Prismatic cells to scale. I think Tesla got blindsided by BYD's LFP Prismatic "Blade" battery. So, Tesla had to buy LFP Prismatic cells from CATL, but Tesla will need to build their own LFP Prismatic cell if they want to produce the "$25K Tesla" that Tesla needs to scale. Therefore, I wouldn't be surprised if Tesla has put the 4680 on the backburner and redirected resources to a different battery.
ReplyDeleteIf Tesla wants to reach extreme size, then they're going to need to go back to the drawing board and come up with a more affordable car for the masses. The current prices are out of reach for 90% of regular people.
ReplyDeleteYes to expanding Solar.
ReplyDeleteMeh to be wasting time and money in Space.
No to Boring ideas.
Growing to extrem size with extremely expensive, cheaply built and designed cars, without many options or models. what could go wrong. That's why we're all driving a Model T today.
ReplyDeleteMore scale = less demand = cheaper prices.
ReplyDeleteThis is exactly what you want and you're STILL complaining about it...
Who says it's not more scare, more demand? I'm complaining because I have a holistic view and I'm not just thinking about my shares short term. Tesla is currently doing everything they can to get the reputation of a horrible company.
Deletethe concept is interesting thou: what manufacturing costs will look like once scaled? what about the battery costs? raw materials? could Tesla be able to sign more favorable contract given bigger volumes. and so on
ReplyDeleteThey will probably be good. But what does it help? They’re claiming to have the highest margins on the market, yet they’re rising prices quicker than anyone else. So being able to manufacture cheaper won’t change a thing. Not being able to sell will, though. Not sure if I want to see that as a shareholder.
Delete