[atomi]

There is a herculean effort by every car manufacturer in the world to compete for Tesla's electric car market share.

In the coming years there will be so much competition in this space.

And then you have Elon snubbing California, one of the largest consumer markets in the space.

I'd short.

[randmeerkat]

Elon Musk will love this: Tesla short sellers lost more than the US airline industry this year

https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/04/investing/tesla-short-sellers...

[calabin]

To be fair, all of the Enron shorts lost their shirts until they didn't. I'm not saying that TSLA is an Enron, but using performance thus far as an indicator of likely performance into the future is a famously poor idea.

TSLA has famously bad QA issues, etc etc I don't need to go on. Few (including some of those who are holding TSLA stock right now) would say that there is meaningful justification for the current valuation.

[weare138]

A more recent example is WeWork.

[opinion-is-bad]

No one got a chance to short WeWork since the IPO never happened.

[seanmcdirmid]

> And then you have Elon snubbing California, one of the largest consumer markets in the space.

And then you look at them as one of the few American brands absolutely killing it in China right now. Not as simple as it seems.

> I'd short.

Everyone who has done this so far as lost their shirt.

[tgsovlerkhgsel]

The impression that other car manufacturers make right now is that they're playing catch-up while Tesla has been getting the electric part of the car right for years (while having issues with the rest of the car, as expected).

There's a good chance that "old" manufacturers with decades-old processes will have a harder time adjusting to an electric world than the hard time Tesla will have figuring out the rest.

Also, Tesla isn't just a car company, they're also a energy storage company. Which I suspect is a massive market too.

[atomi]

Many of these companies have been making cars for generations.

Toyota for example is set to introduce prototypes with solid state batteries in 2021.

Most consumers will opt for their familiar and reliable Camry that happens to run on batteries.

Tesla will need something new to entice consumers. But, I just don't see much more innovation outside battery tech happening.

[Gustomaximus]

> I just don't see much more innovation outside battery tech happening.

This is where I feel the self driving part will come in.

1) First to market and length of lag for other manufactures there.

Imagine there 2 car companies with working self-driving 10+ years before others can catch-up. That will shift the market for domestic and commercial.

2) Self-driving safety stats - this is going to become huge when there are self driving choices.

If one company can say 'we are half as likely to have an accident' type marketing, this is going to become a new and significant factor in vehicle purchase, more so than safety rating are today (I believe anyway) as we are taking out the 'Im in control of my experience' factor.

3) Self driving will flow to other innovation. Cars will no-longer need to be 4 seats facing forward. Huge opportunity to re-think transport once you dont need a driver seat.

[atomi]

Somehow it's going on the S&P.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[shyn3]

This is why I bought post split. I expect it to go higher once added because the institutions have to buy.

[grecy]

> There is a herculean effort by every car manufacturer in the world to compete for Tesla's electric car market share.

Can you link to some sources, please?

The only one that actually seems like it might be going into Volume production is the VW ID.3. There are plenty of articles from 2019 talking about how they'll be building TONS in 2020... but there are no articles in 2020 talking about how many they've built.

No other auto maker has any EV on the books they plan to actually mass produce, they're all just "limited volume".

[emptyfile]

Are there really no articles, or do HN news crowd simply don't read them? Doesn't fit the "Musk is taking us to Mars" narrative present on this site these past 5 years.

Volkswagen’s ID.3 Leapfrogs Tesla, Renault In October European EV Sales Charts

https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeltaylor/2020/11/26/volksw...

[grecy]

That is them selling the backlog of vehicles that was left lying around after they hadn't finished the software.

How many are they now building per month? - find my an article that answers that question please.

[benhurmarcel]

The Renault Zoe, Nissan Leaf, and BMW i3 have been in heavy production for years for example. And in many countries (especially Europe) they outsold Tesla.

[newen]

If these companies could make an electric car that looks remotely good looking, I'd have hope for them (only a matter of time, really).