Apple Potentially Targeting Tesla for Takeover, Says Citi Analyst

The Drive ^ | May 9, 2017 | Rob Stumpf

[2ndDivisionVet]

Could Apple be gunning for an acquisition or merger with Tesla? A Citigroup analyst believes it's a possibility—especially with Apple's huge cash reserve that has recently surpassed a quarter of a trillion dollars. With big things on the horizon for Tesla Motors, and cash burning a hole in Apple’s pocket, it’s an angle to consider.

It's fair to say that Tesla wasn't the only company to appear in this forecast, made by Citigroup analyst Jim Suva. Netflix and Disney are two other big names tossed around in addition to the automaker. But Apple is currently working on a self-driving vehicle program of its own, and was granted a permit for autonomous vehicle testing in California. The company's test vehicles also been spotted testing the tech on-road.

Acquisitions are no surprise for tech companies. It is relatively commonplace for some large organization to be late to party when it comes to new technology. When this happens, the easiest and quickest, though not always the most affordable, entry to the market is to buy out a competitor. Could this potentially be what Apple is up to?

Apple has no shortage of money. The tech giant has more on hand cash than the entire GDP of Chile, Finland, or Greece. Their off-shore bank account numbers are swelling to the tune of $256.8 billion, up $10 billion from last quarter, and $8 billion from the previous. That is a ton of money. Quite literally, as that amount of cash in $100 bills weighs just over 2,231 tons.

Recently, Tesla CEO Elon Musk had met with Apple's head of mergers and acquisitions – much as he has done numerous time before. On a phone call with Bloomberg, Musk declined to speak about if he had had acquisition talks with “one or more companies” over the past year. When asked if Tesla was for sale, Musk responded with “I think that’s very unlikely”.

Musk does mention that if there were a scenario where it would be more likely to create a mass-market affordable car, it would make sense to consider the possibility of selling out. However, at this time, h doesn’t currently see such a scenario. This doesn't mean that the sale isn't an eventuality, just not necessarily a "right now" decision, at least according to Musk. At least we can agree that Musk has his company in mind, and not just the bottom line of his bank account.

[pepsionice]

I would be curious enough to buy one (having looked at the car itself) but my hesitation centers on distance and recharging. I would question how often you have to change out the batteries, and the cost of the change-out. If one could be guaranteed a 500 mile range, and the battery lasting eight to ten years (being reasonable on replacement cost), then I would take a step toward it.

[Jonty30]

265 miles is about 130 miles each way. That is under optimum conditions and a full charge and a battery that hasn’t lost any memory. Any one of these missing results in a battery that would go about half that.

45 minutes would be about what it would take to have a meal, so you are recharging about 45 minutes every 2 hours travel, optimally. Real world conditions would be about every hour, as I said, and that is in summer. In winter, that hour becomes 30 minutes. I don’t call taking 45 minutes to charge for a real world time of a half hour, “feasible”.

This is not a car I would dare go in a road trip with. It’s not worth the tow charge.

[vooch]

“nerd blasphemy”

truer words have never been spoken

[ArcadeQuarters]

> Apple Potentially Targeting Tesla for Takeover, Says Citi Analyst

Alternate headline: Citi analyst owns Tesla stock, wants to sell at inflated price.

[mad_as_he$$]

Great a bullshit artists marries into a cult. What could go wrong?

[mad_as_he$$]

“..charging stations all over”

True as long as you are in a liberal big city area.

[Covenantor]

The key to that is Tesla's battery management system tied to the new generation of Tesla batteries. The software monitors the state of charge for each cell. More complicated than that but that's the essence.

Most people don't realize that the huge Tesla and other auto battery packs are composed of hundreds of cells the same approximate size as laptop batteries.

I salvaged 6 cells from my old laptop battery that were still usable for a USB power bank.

Was a sceptic re: Tesla but with the new battery chemistries, battery management systems, and the more efficient flexible solar panels roof mounted to provide a continous charge that range is closer t becoming reality than before. Still favor the hybrid solution that can take advantage of the same battery/management tech with the added benefit of internal combustion generator on board. Interesting development s, maybe approximating Moore's Law.

[Nifster]

Tesla is a company. Musk is a guy...he’s busy doing other things

[BobL]

“45 minutes would be about what it would take to have a meal, so you are recharging about 45 minutes every 2 hours travel, optimally. Real world conditions would be about every hour, as I said, and that is in summer.”

So let’s take a middle number. You drive your Tesla for an hour, then spend 30 minutes charging - versus driving your real car for 6 hours and spending 15 minutes ‘charging’ (refueling). For a 600 mile drive, you have 4 stops with the Tesla, one stop with the real car. With the Tesla you average 45 miles per hour, including the 4 stops, and with the real car, you average 58 miles per hour. (13 hour trip versus in Tesla, 10.25 hour trip in real car)

So while the Tesla may save you a few seconds getting from zero to 60 after your 45 minute stops, the MUCH FASTER CAR is the real car, which could well be a Yugo.

[Jonty30]

Not to mention that I can store a small quantity of energy, jerrycan, and top up my car without needing an engineering degree, to ensure I didn’t destroy my car by adding more power, a portion of the trip is a particularly long one and there would be a risk of running out of power.

[conserv8]

Storedot, an Israeli company, claims to be developing, and have demonstrated a battery that will charge in about five minutes that can be used in cell phones and the like.
Battery packs can also be placed in vehicles with the same charging expectation rate.

[Sequoyah101]

From what I can see Musk is a master of sucking on the taxpayer teat and promotion rather than tech genius. What the rocket teams have done is impressive though an the car is attractive in a Jaguar sort of way.

[Sequoyah101]

If you look at the Tessa user site the cars are more like very expensive science projects, novelties or entertainment for geeks and tree huggers. The preoccupation seems to be figuring out how to squeeze more out of meager capabilities. They go fast but not far.

[ckilmer]

“doubling the lifetime of the [battery] cells used in the Tesla products… was the goal of the project and it has already been exceeded.
...............
I have seen articles about Tesla for at least two years maybe three which said they were capable of doubling the storage capacity of the batteries so as to double the miles per charge—however!— they could not do it in a way as to not double the cost of the battery.

In the last two days I have seen an article about a german company that planned to triple the storage capacity per charge of batteries but they would not have it ready for prime time until 2020.

This stuff will happen. just not immediately.

[Covenantor]

The Tesla 20700 batteries are larger than the previous 18650’s and are aready in full production, providing IIRC, about 30% greater capacity.

Panasonic version is available at retail prices, as well as being used by the new Bosch tools in an 18 volt package.

[Jim Noble]

Does Tim Cook want to go to Mars?

[ckilmer]

apple has a market cap of +-778 billion. tesla has a market cap of +-53 billion.

apple will be a trillion dollar company in 2 years. tesla will be a trillion dollar company in 10 years.

imho unless musk loses interest in the sun/silicon cells/batteries/rooftop solar shingles/cars model — he will be the one to push tesla on to 1 trillion dollars.

certainly he would be foolish to let tesla go for even double its current market cap because in a year or two tesla’s market cap will double when the model three comes out.

[Shady]

Gee whiz, what would happen with Prince Andrew’s Buffalo Billion?

[Gay State Conservative]

Even with Apple's massive war chest the result of such a merger would...eventually,and it could take a while...be utter collapse.Simply because electric vehicles will,in the end,be no more successful than the Segway which,in the buildup to its release,was,like Tesla,claimed to be destined to change human civilization.

[Swordmaker]

han an hour one way is not feasible. Most people would like to take some sort of road trip every few months.

Then you rent a gasoline or diesel powered automobile for those trips.