[gaustin]

Tesla will be selling into a very complicated industry. You think enterprise sales of software are hard, just wait.

Tesla say their system includes all the functions necessary. I haven't seen a list but I doubt it. Even if they do it will literally take enterprise integration projects to hook them up to the largely bespoke systems used by existing trucking company backends.

(E.g. 20 year old ADP systems)

[ni-hil]

I don't know if the timing is right, but I think what you have to understand here is that all of this is the beginning of the end for the trucking company as you know it.

[gaustin]

Sure, but that end was coming before Tesla was a brand name. The trucking industry is surprisingly innovative, despite overall conservative practices.

Go look at Volvo concept trucks over the last few years.

[rebuilder]

So if Tesla has trucks, and is developing self-driving capability, and the trucking industry is a mishmash of legacy systems, what pieces does Musk need to just go into the trucking business direct?

[gaustin]

This is a huge question. It depends on so many things. We can make assumptions on viable strategies given Tesla's finances and past behavior. But that still leaves us with a lot of solution space.

First you have to accept that the trucking industry is conservative. The mom and pop distributors, the big guys, everyone. The people who own, lease and operate the trucks. There are all sorts of legislative hurdles to deal with.

I think a winning strategy is to start with city or county distributors. Lease out trucks at _very_ competitive rates. Do this with an agreement that your backend (accounting, maintenance, inventory) systems will replace _everything_ at the distributor. At first you'll probably have to compromise on this and integrate some things.

On top of that you pretty much have to integrate your onboard sensors/telematics with consumable manufacturers. Unless you're going to manufacture your own tires and such too.

[rebuilder]

I was thinking more along the lines of Musk setting up a trucking company with a fleet consisting of autonomous Tesla trucks. Obviously not something that can be done right now, but given the push towards self-driving vehicles, and things like Amazon's delivery drones, I'm wondering if the current trucking industry is really Tesla's target market in the long term.

[psergeant]

A more complicated industry than SpaceX sells into?

[gaustin]

Because of its ubiquity, I would put them on par. However, there are many, many more players in trucking than in aerospace which complicates things.