[howeyc]

> Further if they start today it will be 24 months before they can launch something.

You are assuming other companies have not yet started building electric cars. This is extremely false. I was at the Detroit Auto Show in Jan 2011 and saw Ford driving a fully-electric Fusion around the showroom floor.

Tesla certainly appears to be ahead publicly, but I'm not so sure that's the case.

[ChuckMcM]

Actually I was looking at the auto show data. One of the fastest 'show to road' cars was the Toyota Land Rover at 18 months but the electrics have taken longer (at least the Volt and Leaf did). The steps I saw at the San Jose show were tentative at best.