Guest post by David Middleton

Tesla misses the mark on Model 3 production – by a lot

by Chris Isidore @CNNTech
October 2, 2017

Tesla announced it fell far short of its plan to build 1,500 of its first mass market car, the Model 3, in the third quarter.

The actual number it built? 260, or 83% less than promised.

The announcement made late Monday is another sign of the challenges the upstart electric car maker may face as it tries to build a more affordable electric car — a basic version of which priced at about $35,000.

Shares of Tesla (TSLA) fell 1.5% in after-hours trading after the company released the news.

Tesla said most of the lines at the Gigafactory, its battery plant in Nevada, and its auto assembly plant in California were meeting their production targets, but that “a handful have taken longer to activate than expected.”

[…]

[T]he Model 3 is not the first time it has fallen well behind promised production targets. Tesla’s high-priced crossover, the Model X, went into production in late 2015, long after originally promised and had a slower-than-expected roll out. Production of the Model S sedan, its best selling vehicle to date, was also much slower than originally promised.

Krebs said Tesla missing deadlines is “part of their track record.”

[…]

CNN Money

Tesla’s Model 3 production guidance was…

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Tony Stark’s Elon Musk’s Ponzi Scheme business model will, no doubt, continue to thrive so long as the OPM keeps flowing in.  Stark’s Musk’s business model has been so “successful” that everyone is trying to get in on the act…

Automakers Plan Electric Car Blitz as Tesla Burns Billions

By David Welch
October 1, 2017

• Regulations, Musk’s marketing mastery seen as key reasons
• Field gets crowded in market most buyers have yet to embrace

Here are two facts that defy logic: By the end of the year, electric-car maker Tesla Inc.will have burned through more than $10 billion without ever having made 10 cents. Yet companies around the world are lining up to compete with it.

Almost 50 new pure electric-car models will come to market globally between now and 2022, including vehicles from Daimler AG and Volkswagen AG. General Motors Co. raised the stakes Monday by pledging to sell 20 all-electric vehicles by 2023, including launching two new EVs in the next 18 months. Even British inventor James Dyson is getting into the game, announcing last week that he’s investing two billion pounds ($2.7 billion) to develop an electric car and the batteries to power it.

The reasons for chasing Tesla are part city hall, part show business. Regulators in Beijing have laid out a plan to mandate electric vehicle production in China, while California requires carmakers to build more EVs or be forced to buy credits from rivals. At the same time, Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk and his sleek cars have captured the imagination of Americans to the point where consumers and investors are throwing money at his Silicon Valley company.

“Nobody doubts that the future will be electric,” said Erich Joachimsthaler, founder and CEO of brand-strategy firm Vivaldi, which works with German luxury carmakers. “The car companies dragged their feet with electric. Now they are being dragged into it by Tesla and by regulations.”

[…]

That will make for a very crowded field in a nascent zero-emission car market that most consumers have yet to embrace and where financial losses loom large. In the U.S., electric car sales were less than 1 percent of the market last year, according to the International Energy Agency. They were 1.4 percent in China and in the U.K.

“Companies are committed to electric cars, but there is little evidence that there is a lot of consumer demand for it,” said Kevin Tynan, senior analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence.

[…]

The list of companies piling in added an unusual name last week when Dyson, who made billions making high-end vacuum cleaners, announced his foray into the electric car market. Dyson said his car will be radically different from the vehicles being designed by Tesla and the established carmakers.

Read more: A vacuum billionaire’s quest to make a car that doesn’t suck

Since Dyson doesn’t compete with Tesla or need to meet rules faced by traditional automakers, the planned car may be more of a flight of fancy, said Joachimsthaler of Vivaldi.

“More likely, this is an Icarus complex,” he said. “He will realize he flew a little too close to the sun.”

Bloomberg

So… The EV frenzy is being driven by two things:

1. The desire to be the next Icarus Tony Stark Elon Musk.
2. Government regulations designed to save the world from HYDRA Gorebal Warming.

And not by:

1. Consumer demand for the product.
2. Realistic profit motive.

What could go wrong with such a brilliant plan?  It sounds just like…

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How about those PEV sales? Aren’t they awesome?

September 2017 CAR SALES will be reported on Tuesday, October 3rd, 2017 beginning with the Nissan LEAF and Chevrolet Volt sales at 6:30-7:30 PT (9:30-10:30 AM ET), and finishes with Ford’s plug-in data in the afternoon of Wednesday, October 4th, 2017.

Every month InsideEVs tracks all the plug-in sales for the United States by auto maker and brand. Below, readers can find all the historical sales charts for the “current generation” of electric vehicles, as well as a synopsis of the current month’s sales happenings by specific EV below the charts…

InsideEVs

• Total US PEV (all makes & models combined) sales in August 2017: 16,624
• Ford F – Series PU sales in August 2017: 77,007

I’ll update this post if September PEV sales (all makes & models combined) top the Ford F-Series… Or even the GMC Sierra.

At this rate, PEV’s will finish second to the onset the next Quaternary glacial stage in the race to save the planet from Gorebal Warming!  Speaking of saving the planet…

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I just can’t play that George Carlin video often enough!

As usual, any and all sarcasm and ridicule were 100% intentional… And I actually do think that Tesla cars are waaaaayyyy cool from a tech perspective.

Featured image borrowed from Agile Alliance.

Did anyone else notice that Elon Musk had a cameo in Iron Man 2?

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