this post was submitted on 04 May 2024
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133
What’s happening at Tesla? Here’s what experts think. (arstechnica.com)
submitted 6 months ago by [email protected] to c/technology
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[–] homesweethomeMrL 149 points 6 months ago (5 children)

"However, in 2024, I do believe it’s well past time to Elon to step aside. The lack of focus on the core business is hurting the company’s long-term prospects, especially in China, where there is a huge amount of competition, and those companies are redesigning products every two years," Abuelsamid said.

. . . Just don't expect it to happen. "Unfortunately, Tesla has effectively no corporate governance from its board full of Musk cronies, and he will never acknowledge when he has made a mistake and will thus not step aside," Abuelsamid said.

Death it is, then.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 6 months ago

it will be hilarious when musk fails yet again

[–] kmartburrito 20 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Death by a thousand cuts

[–] [email protected] 11 points 6 months ago

To shreds, you say?

[–] db2 6 points 6 months ago

Administered by anyone but Elon, of course.

[–] inclementimmigrant 17 points 6 months ago (2 children)

And it's be okay with that honestly.

Sure he's an asshole, always was, but his money got the electric car competition started and now there's actually viable cars and a somewhat competitive market that could survive the loss of Tesla.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 6 months ago (2 children)

That's like saying that Apple started the home computer competition going.

There's a big difference between bucking trends and skipping steps for the sake of being different, and actually moving the industry forward.

Under a non-sociopathic leadership Tesla battery and engine tech would have been in most Western car brands by now.

Instead, let's look at what Tesla has really brought us:

  • electric tech that's today just one (rather unremarkable) version among many;
  • failing cruising tech (I don't even want to use "self driving" because that's pure marketing drivel);
  • abysmal build quality and customer support;
  • rising car and insurance prices;
  • lots of car tech moved from hardware into software, which means surveillance, lower quality, lower usability and ergonomy;
  • and last but not least a whole lot of shirking responsibility.

That's the Tesla legacy that the car industry has inherited.

[–] captainlezbian 3 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Tesla’s biggest move was that they were willing to actually compete with an EV. GM released one in the 90s and seriously go look into it. Everyone who bought it fucking loved the thing. But gm killed the project and destroyed the vehicles.

Tesla actually took sales away from ices. That forced them to actually sell evs

[–] homesweethomeMrL 3 points 6 months ago

Preach

[–] [email protected] 13 points 6 months ago (1 children)

That last sentence stuck out to me too, a simple summary of all this mess. The other interesting part was at the end of the article, where they talk about the potential for the NHTSA requiring a recall fix for the "autopilot" feature that would be so expensive as to seriously damage the company:

The scenario there is if the government is really serious about Autopilot, and frankly, I don't remember the last time NHTSA investigated the efficacy of a recall remedy... he knows that NHTSA is insisting on a hardware fix for Autopilot and FSD," Niedermeyer said, referencing the auto safety regulator's unusual decision to apply extra scrutiny to Tesla's 2-million-car safety recall, announced last week.

With 2 million affected cars on the road, any fix that requires hardware—adding back radar, perhaps, or infrared gaze-tracking driver monitoring, wouldn't be cheap or quick to complete. "If NHTSA demands a level of remedy to problems that can't simply be done affordably... then it's a negative margin business with no way out. And that's a problem you can't just spend your way out of," Niedermeyer said.

[–] homesweethomeMrL 1 points 6 months ago

Right! Like he knows the jig is up so he’s pulling out all his capital now to let the memestock fanbois take the fall. God forbid anyone rich ever suffer consequences.

[–] APassenger 12 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Someone with deep pockets needs to buy the super charging network.

Rebrand and keep building.

I'm pretty sure there's a path to wealth in that idea. I have neither the means nor the skill. But some does. Just not Musk.

[–] barsquid 10 points 6 months ago

Someone needs to eminent domain the super charging network and run it as a service or at worst a utility.

[–] MrVilliam 49 points 6 months ago (1 children)

The answer is actually pretty simple. Musk is a man child who doesn't like criticism. He lives in a bubble. He fires people who disagree with him and listens to anybody who fawns over him. He appeals to the loudest ones he allows himself to hear. That's why he made that dumbass truck. There's not actually many people who want that hideous, broken monstrosity, but his worshippers shouted that they wanted a truck.

He's also scrambling to get money coming in. Twitter is falling apart. People are starting to wake up and realize that he's nothing more than a lucky nepo dipshit. To soften his losses, he's doing a shitload of layoffs and cutting corners wherever he can. Quality is dropping on his products that already had quality issues. Brand recognition and reputation will start to be a net negative factor as a result.

If he wants to turn Tesla around, musk needs to pivot to producing tech for other car companies and stop making cars themselves.

[–] NutWrench 12 points 6 months ago

All Musk wants is that bong-hit of attention he gets from getting his name in the news. This is why he blew 44 billion on Twitter. He really doesn't care if Twitter or Tesla succeed or not. He gets bored with his toys quickly if they don't provide him with the attention he craves.