[milfot]

Yeah, all good points. I don't think this should stop tesla trying, or rather, it would be a shame if they were prevented from trying.

i believe it is a matter of restructuring both risks and incentives to make the downstream match the upstream, as you say.. for example, with the saas approach, for say 5k a year, your 5k profit over 5 years per user (add 5k for R&D and 5k for a facelift) turns into 20k profit over 10 years.. and the user gets a guaranteed service - the user and manuf. interests align..

The bigger issue I think, in terms of turning around the current approach, is actually a cultural one in which a car is a personal 'fetish' object rather than the cumulative efforts of a supply chain bundled into a personal transport service.