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by jansan 256 days ago
> That's great, but the writing is still on the wall if Toyota doesn't get serious about electric cars.

It seems they know what they are doing. Toyota is a very profitable car manufacturer, with profit in 2024 more than Tesla and Volkswagen combined. Unlike Nissan, the maker of the best selling EV of all time, who is struggling very hard.
1 comments
decimalenough 256 days ago
Tesla sells nearly as many cars in a quarter (497,099 in Q3 2025) as the Leaf managed in its entire lifetime (577,000 between 2010 and 2022).
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jansan 256 days ago
I stand corrected, the Leaf figure was wrong. Nevertheless, Toyota is very profitable despite (or because?) it does not sell a significant number of EVs. Margins on EVs are currently extremely low or even negative, and that is hurting EV manufaturers more than ICE manufacturers.
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hopelite 256 days ago
Is the hating Tesla tantrum over?

That being said, you can’t really compare the sales of all of Teslas to the sales of one specific form factor/model with any kind of seriousness. Nor do I think it’s a fair comparison to compare Tesla that has parted on various hype patterns over the years to tap the zealots into even becoming their free advertisement and marketing departments not unlike how Apple fanboy cult people at least used to be. Toyota is a mature, reasonable enterprise whose sales are orders of magnitude larger than Tesla’s and there are many people’s lives dependent on being reasonable when shifting things, not “disrupt” in a typical tech bro narcissistic way.

For context Tesla has roughly 2 million sales with 125,000 employees, Toyota has 11 million sales with 385,000 employees. I assume I don’t need to do the math for you.

And that’s without going into the various battery issues and the now conflicting electricity interests between EV and AI.

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rogerrogerr 256 days ago
The Toyota number is very misleading because dealership employees don’t have Toyota badges; they have Dave’s Hometown Stealership badges. Tesla store employees have Tesla badges.

You’re counting customer-facing employees for Tesla and leaving them out for Toyota.

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lotsofpulp 256 days ago
95% (actual percentage) of Teslas sold are Model 3 or Model Y, so one can cut that sales figure in half and still reasonably compare to the sales of another model.

>And that’s without going into the various battery issues and the now conflicting electricity interests between EV and AI.

I do not understand what this means. Isn't the same gas used to power vehicles used to power turbines that provide electricity?

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