MUSK’S MASTER PLAN MORE ‘DUH’ THAN ‘DEUX’
No matter what side of the electric vehicle/greenhouse emissions/the-world-is-ending debate you’re on, you have to admit that the original Tesla was, well, masterful.
Indeed, for an upstart with no experience as an automobile manufacturer to go from a crude, hardly sophisticated little roadster based on an equally crude, hardly sophisticated supercar wannabe — I’m talking, of course, about the original Tesla Roadster — to the incredibly sophisticated, painfully gorgeous four-door Model S, was a leap no one could have predicted. And, perhaps, one no one except an ideologically motivated messiah would have even attempted.
Credit where due then, the Model S was in every way a “master” stroke.
But Master Plan “Part Deux” as Tesla Motors co-founder Elon Musk calls it? Sadly, Musk may have lost his mojo. Master Plan Redux reads like the kind of tepid, predictable prognostication he once used to decry Detroit as past its peak.
Building a complete model range? Jeez, Elon, you mean that wasn’t part of the original Master Plan? Back then, were you really only going to build one more model after the Model S?
And you’re going to build selfdriving buses? Who isn’t? I’m pretty sure that the first conceptualization of autonomous public transportation came, what, about five nanoseconds after the first DARPA Challenge. Claiming self-driving buses are part of a future only you can envision is a bit like Donald Trump saying he is the only person who can save America.
Your idea for an autonomously driving semi? Again with the déjà vu. My God, man, how dumb do you think we are? Pretty much every trucker on the planet is worried some Uber-like service is going to punt them out of their cabs. How is predicting the already accepted masterful?
And electric pickups? Seriously, you think you’re going to challenge Detroit in the truck segment?
Oh, to be sure, you’re going to get the same Hollywood dilettantes to “hitch their wagon” to Tesla. But you’re going to peddle Silicon Valley pickups in Texas? I’ve just got to see this. Bubba and his buddies, I’ll remind you, like their diesels loud and proud.
You better have that P90D set to full “Ludicrous” so you can skedaddle before they get to their rifle racks.
And you’re going to make Autopilot better? That’s really your idea of a master plan? Note to Elon: Your “semi” self-driving system was involved in the first autonomous automobile road fatality.
And let’s remind the folks here what Autopilot missed seeing: a freakin’ huge, shouldn’t-it-havebeen-obvious tractor trailer. Across the roadway, in full profile, no less. I’d say getting better would be trifle obvious, wouldn’t you?
So, if Master Plan Part Deux, is not the revolution the original was, what purpose does it really serve? Is this, as many analysts are labelling it, just a “doubling down” on a proven formula?
Is it one last incredible prognostication to attract a mainstream automaker to buy Tesla, lock, stock and barrel? Cashing out is something more than a few analysts have long predicted for Musk.
But the timing doesn’t seem right. Later, when Tesla is even more ingrained in more subsidyrich industries, perhaps. But right now, it seems a trifle early for Musk to take the money and run.
Nope, methinks this grandiose buildup was just the oldest of snake oil salesman sideshows — the misdirection. Tesla is under investigation for its Autopilot failures and, for the first time since its Roadster first rolled out of Menlo Park in 2008, the company is under attack from a mainstream media previously fawning in its coverage of Musk.
Then there’s the question of profits, a word Musk seems to view with the same disdain as our own prime minister.
Once again, Tesla went back to market for yet another cash infusion. Is this the 14th, or the 41st? I can’t remember. But, for a company that promises profitability is right around the corner, it’s been too many.
Nor is the headline-generating Model 3 the answer. Tesla can’t make money on the US$100,000 Model S. Scaling it down by less than a third is not going to magically make the entire process profitable at $35,000.
Eventually, even the most “enlightened” of investors will start clamouring for, oh, what’s that word Musk dares not mouth? Ah, yes — returns.
Maybe Musk sees the writing on the wall. Maybe even Wall Street is finally getting investor fatigue for continually forking over billions to a company that just builds a narrow range of sedans and crossovers.
But hey, how about some real money for an all-new company that builds everything from commercial trucks to super-sedans in a Daimler-Benz-like fashion. We’re not just cutting emissions and promoting shared mobility, we’re revolutionizing the basic precept of transportation.
I’ll even sweeten the deal. I’ll throw in a nice, emissions-free, hydrocarbons-be-gone solar panel company.
You say that it’s losing money too? Pshaw, details. The fact I already hold a major stake in SolarCity? Pure coincidence!
And while I’m at it, if you really do have that much cash to burn, I can probably get you that bridge in Brooklyn you’ve been wanting as well.