The traditional auto industry in the United States is hamstrung by union regulations that eliminate any innovation and by a financing model that also limits innovation. Dealerships are a financing model. A dealer keeps X amount of loan that pays for Y amount of product. Largely, a dealership has to take a certain amount of junk they can’t sell so they can get the few things they can sell. This is necessary because the manufacturers are set up to mass produce particular models on particular lines. If those models are suddenly unpopular the manufacturers can’t easily change to something else. Thus, the dealerships sometimes end up scrapping cars because they can’t be sold. They can’t be given away either as that would subtract other sales that could be made.
Tesla declared it wasn’t an auto manufacturer. They were a technology company. Therefore, they don’t use the handcuffs of the dealership financing model. They aren’t union, which means they can innovate as much as they want.
I think that fire insurance will eliminate any of the current types of batteries. If Tesla can invent another, less dangerous battery, then they’ll survive. I have the highest hopes that they will survive as the present manufacturers need to die so they can be reborn. If it hadn’t been for Obama breaking laws and tradition, we’d already have a better vehicle industry. Instead, he kept the old production models on life support. England did exactly the same thing. Because of that today there are no big British auto manufacturers. As far as I’m concerned, I’ll never own another American made car from what is known as The Big Three.
I agree broadly with your first two paragraphs.I think that fire insurance will eliminate any of the current types of batteries. If Tesla can invent another, less dangerous battery, then they’ll survive.
Here we disagree quite strongly; Tesla has formed its own insurance company and thus is acutely aware of risk. Part of Tesla’s sauce is the way it uses your onboard computer to help baby your battery - your computer adjusts the temperature of your battery to, for example, behave best during charging.On that other thread you mentioned a huge fire which you said started in a hybrid car. Guess what! That’s a telltale of the fact that it did not start in a Tesla. Tesla doesn’t do hybrids.
I will add that Tesla’s Shanghai “gigafactory” is Tesla’s main export hub. It exports cars from there by the multiple shipload, and if Tesla ever had a fire in one of those ships the cost would, to put it mildly, show up in the next earnings call. Hasn’t happened, ain’t likely to happen. IMHO.