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Things at Tesla are worse than they appear (edition.cnn.com)

submitted 1 day ago by technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com to c/technology@lemmy.world

56 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Things are undoubtedly bad at Tesla. Its sales are dwindling. Its profits are plunging, as is its share price. There are regular protests outside its showrooms. The Cybertruck is a flop. And somehow, it’s actually a lot worse than that.

The 71% drop in net income it just reported may have been overshadowed by CEO Elon Musk’s announcement that he would be stepping back from his controversial duties at the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). But that drop is just one indication of serious financial sickness at the EV maker, problems brought on by falling sales for the first time in its history and falling prices for electric vehicles.

The bottom line problem at Tesla is its vanishing bottom line. A deeper look at its first quarter report shows it’s now losing money on what should be its ostensible reason for existence – selling cars.

It was only able to post a $409 million profit in the quarter thanks to the sale of $595 million worth of regulatory credits to other automakers.

But if the Trump administration gets its way, the company can kiss those regulatory credits keeping it in the black goodbye, too.

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[+] AA5B@lemmy.world -7 points 7 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago) (1 children)

Not good. There’s still some remnant of the idealistic vision, hiding from the Nazi.

robotaxis will eventually be a good thing, but it will be a long time before they’re profitable. I’m all for the experiment, whether teslas approach succeeds or not, but Tesla can no longer afford to stick to a money losing experiment
the semi has huge potential to disrupt the trucking industry and rapidly decarbonize it. While I do see other companies experimenting with battery trucks, no one else has the potential combining mass produced parts from other vehicles, mass produced charging stations and mega storage, nor are taking the risk to scale up manufacturing. We need to electrify trucking and like it or not Tesla has some unique strengths that may help them succeed first. We need this
these are teslas big upcoming efforts and they’re both an attempt to be revolutionary, which means risky, money losing. While I can get onboard the protest bandwagon, deprive the Nazi of his god level wealth, we need the EV revolution in trucking

[–] tfm@europe.pub 5 points 6 hours ago (2 children)

robotaxis

It's going to be a disaster. Tesla "FSD" is glorified cruise control on level 2 on the autonomous driving scale.

semi

It's already a disaster. The economics don't add up and the few on the road break down all the time.

[–] AA5B@lemmy.world 1 points 1 hour ago

I tried fsd demo this spring and it’s getting pretty good. I wouldn’t use it but it was perfect on well marked roads. The thing is it made me realize just how poorly maintained our roads are and everything is an edge case. For example it didn’t stay in lane at one Intersection but the intersection was a weird offset plus the lines were all faded away. Although I also disnt give it any chance to recover so I suppose it could have been ok: Im not risking it not recovering

It might surprise everyone but mostly by staying in a well maintained well mapped area, like Waymo did. There’s no way it fulfills the claim of self-driving everywhere without more improvements

The robots is will have the next generation computer and higher resolution cameras which may help. However that also allows more overhead for the next ai update

[–] lowered_lifted@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

don't other truck manufacturers that actually know how to build a truck also make electrified models?

[–] NotMyOldRedditName@lemmy.world 1 points 5 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago)

There are other electric semi trucks out there, but none (at least as of last year) compare in specs and capabilities. The big issue is their power consumption is much higher than the Tesla Semi which has been repeatedly validated by their testers as even better than what Tesla advertises. Efficiency will be king in this kind of business.

Worse efficiency = less range = more batteries = less load capacity = less money per delivery

E.g this is from DHL

https://www.dhl.com/global-en/delivered/responsibility/dhl-tests-tesla-semi-electric-truck.html

Over a two-week trial period this summer, DHL Supply Chain USA took a thorough look under the hood of the Tesla Semi, integrating the e-truck into 3,000 miles (5,000 km) of normal operations out of Livermore, California. The trial included one long haul of 390 miles (625 km) – fully loaded with a gross combined weight of 75,000 pounds (34 metric tons) – confirming the Tesla Semi’s ability to carry typical DHL payloads over a long distance on a single charge.

During the trial, the trial vehicle averaged 1.72 kWh/mile operating at speeds exceeding 50 mph (80 km/h) on average for over half its time on the road. The result exceeded our expectations and even Tesla’s own rating.

Putting the Tesla Semi to the test allowed us to validate whether it could travel 500 miles with a fully loaded trailer and see what our drivers thought of the truck’s performance. We were encouraged by how quickly they gained confidence with the vehicle and leveraged the Tesla’s smart features to help improve performance, comfort, and the overall driver experience.

Edit: Just some examples... I don't know if these have been verified in use unlike the Tesla, so all theoretical based on the advertised miles/battery size.

Mercedes: 1.935 kWh/mile (310 miles)
Kenworth: 2.5 kWh/mile (200 miles)
Volvo: 2.05 kWh/mile (275miles)

And those are all shorter range at that.

Edit: I should also add... we don't know the price of the Tesla Semi. Its possible that its ridiculously priced and the increased efficiency is negated even over the life of the vehicle compared to the other trucks. That's a big unknown given these are pilot vehicles.