Tesla and Solar City Combine
tesla.com
tesla.com
Certainly for any global expansion, I don't think many people outside the US know about Solar City. Where I am in Belgium, Tesla cars are about as prevelant on the roads as Range Rovers and everyone from my nephew to my mother in law knows about it.
As they also say it's a way to get people to the Tesla Stores which should benefit Tesla in a similar way to Apple stores.
He is attempting to create a Von Neumann probe. But it's no easy endeavor. So he has to monetize and publicize the whole affair.
But if you tell people that you're making a Von Neumann probe people will either have no idea what you're talking about or think you're crazy.
So he's sell the public on the idea of rockets. hes selling them on the idea of electric cars. He's even somehow made batteries that mount on the wall of their garages exciting. And the even crazier thing is that he's selling them himself and somehow making that interesting.
But what he's really building with all of this is a Von Neumann probe. The interesting thing with SpaceX, Tesla and Solarcity aren't the products -- it's the factories that make them.
How long until he can use these factories to make more factories and they can fit into a rocket I wonder?
The presentation covers the viability of constructing Von Neumann probes for colonizing the entire universe and illustrates the feasibility of it with a few different technological scenarios.
All in all it seems feasible and the implications of that are enormous.
I think another possibility worthy of serious consideration given the implication of the presentation I linked above is the existance of many bracewell probes[1] in our solar system.
If an alien civilization has the capability of seeding the universe with spacecraft it's definitely not a stretch that they would burrow them inside an asteroid to conduct subtle observations of noteworthy planets.
Well, since we can never know that for sure (even if we identify a filter, is it the filter? Is there more than one?), the best we can do is try to move forward and make it increasingly unlikely that the things we think are candidates to being a filter can effect us. First and foremost, get off-planet, which brings us full circle to Musk, who is on record as stating he started SpaceX to spur Mars colonization.
Either because it tends to involve the development of Von Neumann probes that unexpectedly turn on their creators or because it signals to latent berserker probes sitting in the asteroid belt that we have reached a threat threshold and need to be eliminated.
Either way I agree that we need to try to get off this planet in a meaningful and permanent way.
if elon musk wanted to make more money he could have done it in other ways with much less risk. founding spacex and tesla only make sense if there was some genuine desire to make the world a better place. a man who put everything on the line for these visions and nearly lost everything would, upon surpassing everyones expecations or even their wildest dreams, suddenly become a shady fraudster and initiate a shady scheme to make a little money? that makes no sense.
i get so mad at people who are constantly detracting from tesla or evs in general. it is so ironic that the one company that isnt trying to fuck people over, perhaps the only large company that has nothing but the betterment of the world on the agenda, is constantly berated and dismissed by everyone.
That has to be the most naive statement I've seen on Hacker News.
And, once that explanatory paragraph was written, you could remove the insult and just let it stand on its own.
I also think that people should be strongly discouraged from making claims like "here is a man who twice bet his personal fortune on these companies with no other apparent motive besides making the world a better place." That statement actively decreased the quality of discussion. Hopefully bronz will think before posting in the future.
It's about what you say AND how you say it.
That's fine. What I'm referring to doesn't actually have to yield further discussion. Some people will take belittlement, accept it as an indication they should have thought through their position better (if that was indeed the cause). Others will immediately become defensive and start responding to something that doesn't really need a response. Sometimes it just depends on the mood of the person. Not using insults (or at least making them clearly supplemental to the supported point) helps avoid this.
Insults are appeals to emotion. Emotion is exactly what you don't want when you are trying to avoid useless discussion. I understand the pull, and I'm sure I fall into the trap myself from time to time. Sometimes someone says something that seems divorced from reality, and you find the premise so absurd that you find it hard to address it seriously. It feels good to strongly call out the absurdity for what it is, and people who agree enjoy seeing it, but ultimately it makes it more about you than the point. For example, I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment of your original comment. I just think it's slightly self defeating when the discussion is between many people in a group setting, because it often yields more useless comments as people dig in on their sides.
> It's about what you say AND how you say it.
That's the exact point I was trying to make in the prior comment.
Elon Musk: Pour fortune into building actual things, get shit on by startup culture.
Haters gonna hate.
> He's definitely not in it primarily for the cash.
I don't see any evidence whatsoever for this assertion.
Now, I have the luxury of being able to take him at face value because I have no vested interest in any of these companies, as you may not. That said, a fair many people here do in some way or another (as a customer, an investor, or in some related market or field). It behooves them to be very critical.
Maybe you should care less about the fact that people like a consumer product company less than you? And the idea that this is the "one company" not trying to fuck people over is down right ludicrous.
Manageable being the opposite of out-of-control.
You're forgetting ego. Really, your last paragraph shows you're a true believer and it's not helping the discussion.
Seriously in a world run by bean counters and MBA's where the only excitement is Donald Trumps next dick move or how thin the next iPhone is going to be how can you not like what this guys trying to achieve.
I have noticed some interesting parallels between some Donald Trump supporters on a certain subreddit[0] and some HNer regarding Musk (example comments up top): they both assume their hero/idol is working on an inscrutable genius masterplan which us mere mortals will retroactively understand one glorious day in the future. According to the true believers, Trump is allegedly playing 4D political chess and Musk intends to upgrade humanity to a Type II civilization... Both groups could very well be correct, but I'm cynical given the supporting evidence I currently have access to.
1. /r/the_donald - I am a non-American lefty trying to understand wtf is going on. I also like having my assumptions challenged
so yeah, i kind of have a chip on my shoulder. its only because the success that electric vehicles are currently experiencing came after a long, tooth and nail fight led jointly by tesla and electric vehicle enthusiasts and absolutely nobody else. tesla and by extension elon musk deserve huge credit for what they have accomplished because in the end this is a victory for everyone.
What do you think is the correct way of going about determining if a person has sincere ideals or is just a con artist?
Things I do are good + I am in trouble financially -> Conflict of interest doesn't matter, because it's to save Important things.
It's possible to have sincere ideals and still make iffy judgement calls. The positioning makes sense, but who here would bet that this would have still happened if both companies were turning a profit?
This is not the first time this decision needed to be made: http://www.theverge.com/2015/5/14/8605597/elon-musk-discusse...
Do you even understand what you're saying? Solarcity 'loses' money because they invest all their profits and more into expansion. Same goes for Tesla. You should read the quarterlies and SEC notices yourself.
I think that's very short sighted. If your goal actually requires a lot of resources then theoretically amassing a lot of money, or getting a lot of investor goodwill through making them a lot of money may be a way to go about it.
There may be completely different strategies required for acting on different timescales. If your plan is to achieve something in a year or two, the path may be fairly obvious to those looking on. If you are working on a timescale of decades, it may be much harder to see the plan. The quickest way between two points may be a straight line, but that doesn't mean that's the most likely way to succeed.
Now, for how this applies to Musk and Tesla, he's been very forthcoming about his eventual goals. For Tesla in the medium term, that's to prove the technology through a sports car (done), prove the automation and assembly through a factory (done), and to use this to build cars at scale and offer them much cheaper (a promise yet to be delivered on). It's not hard to see how high margins could have been useful in these prior steps. What remains to be seen is whether he actually follows through on the promise. In any case, I don't see any reason why current margins prevent an altruistic goal.
If you look over his actions for his whole career with tesla and solarcity, he seems to be either an idealist or just a legitimate businessman. I can't see any way he is setting himself up to steal an immense amount of money from investors or customers, and run off to some place without an extradition treaty (Mars?).
http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/ABEA-4CW8X0/254764622...
After the deal closes, expected to be Q4 2016, the ownership split will be:
93.5% Tesla / 6.5% SolarCity
Interestingly, this is an all shares deal. With most people assuming Telsa will need to raise another large round soon to fund full scale production of the Model 3 it will be interesting to see what sort of terms, if any, Tesla will need to give investors to raise.
Current shareholders don't seem too put off the by constant dilution of this acquisition or the constant equities raises. Tesla's short interest is high as always, so they continue to be one of the most polarizing companies around:)
Fun note in the presentation, Solar City has a shop window in the deal where they can take this deal and shop it to other companies to try and get a better deal. Anyone want to take a bet as to whether or not they actually try and shop this deal at all?
Disclaimer: TSLA investor.
It's easy to understand your point of view; jaynos's is a little more mysterious.
I do agree with another poster that SolarCity was more likely to be heading towards $0, rather than back to $75.
1. TSLA is close to it's all time high. SCTY is well below it's all time high (Granted, I don't see it going back to $80+ anytime).
2. TSLA market cap (34.5B) is 70% that of Ford (49.3B) or GM (49.7B). I know Ford and GM are probably undervalued and there are many differences between them and Tesla, but this suggests to me that Tesla is overvalued.
3. Solar City market cap is 2.4 billion. Solar City has a market share in the US of 34% (approx). Solar City market cap compared to the rest of the industry makes sense.
4. The Solar Industry is here to stay. Solar City, as the US leader, is not going bankrupt (the Tesla board of directors agrees with me on this or they would not approve the deal). Investments would swing back to SCTY at some point pushing the stock to $40-$50 (or ~4-5 billion in market cap).
I don't think anything unfair happened to you.
This seems like an unusually sketchy move from him.
Well, I assume that means the Powerwall, in which case I agree, they do have a lot of the same customers.
I think there's a lot of potential to market Tesla cars/batteries to Solarcity customers, and Panels to Tesla car/battery owners. I wouldn't be surprised to see combo packages sold in the future.
So a lot of people with the cars have Solar City installs on their roof.
However, even if we did move ALL cars off gas, the emissions problem is still very large, and solving it could reduce emissions by 65% [1]. This seems to be a 2 pronged approach, reduce car emissions, and reduce generic energy emissions. This alone won't solve the crisis, but it's a significant contribution.
Based on my local grid, my car runs on roughly one third coal, one third natural gas, and one third nuclear. This seems pretty good, especially as it seems like the coal part will continue to decrease throughout the lifetime of the car.
Of course, with SolarCity joining Tesla, soon you'll be able to get both the car and the energy to run that car from the same company. Assuming your living situation allows for solar power, anyway.
I'm not sure about the tradeoff in efficiency between electricity transmission and generation in larger capacity: I'm just going to assume the cost and benefit in this set cancel out since we have more larger installations than local power generation.
- Build roughly 6 sets of geographically distributed wind/solar farms (with 6 separate sets of transmission infrastructure) to handle base-load demand reliably. Expensive.
- Attach a whole bunch of batteries to the grid to smooth out demand. Also (currently) expensive.
I think Elon Musk's solution is to convince enough people to buy huge battery packs that they occasionally drive around, but mostly leave plugged in to the grid.
Musk's plan is also to sell literal battery packs that attach to the wall, provide for expansion, and work in tandem. Which he is already doing.
Only 14% of emissions come from transport (as per your reference) and, assuming an eventual complete transportation reform, that's still not enough. Master plan part (french N): shift/grow into the energy and industrial sectors. More announcements are coming, the only concern I have is that they come fast enough.
Though the hyperloop is a bit shady too. I guess he's not really involved in it anymore though.
Tesla and Solar City on the other hand seems to make perfect sense. Why do you think it's shady? (ahah, shady, solar...)
That said, it's not like the conflict of interest is a secret. Musk is going to get the deal approved by Tesla shareholders. Personally, I would be more skeptical in their place, but apparently they are fairly enthusiastic about it. So whatever, more power to him and to them.
Is the Powerwall just was an optional accessory to upsell to Tesla automobile customers? If so, then the SolarCity deal is bad for both parties. I am inclined to believe not.
If the purpose of Tesla is to transition humans from fossil fuels to solar then it would appear that this makes sense from multiple points of view. Presumably Tesla can do a better job at doing this faster and quicker than SolarCity could on its own. This is a really, really big task and making some comparisons about how SolarCity may capture a greater amount of future profits by itself is underestimating the future competitive environment and likelihood of a positive outcome.
The thing for investors to look at critically going forward is how Tesla advances in manufacturing capability relative to the competition. The attempt at raw materials in, finished goods out, at a very high rate of speed, speaks strongly for how Tesla is trying to achieve their underlying mission.
Perhaps in 5 years many companies will be able to accomplish this. If so, further shareholder dilution is a big problem. Tesla could be wildly overvalued. Other car companies are producing good electric cars and they will be self-driving soon. Doing an ok job of those two things alone can't justify Tesla's value or survival. Uber's transportation network effects combined with the huge drop in auto sales from vehicle sharing will gut any plausible profits.
Value investors beware. Also a good exercise in why just doing traditional balance sheet & income statements combined with a linear evaluation of the business results in tech companies always looking way overvalued (Facebook being wildly overvalued since Mark Zuckerberg turned down the $1b offer from Yahoo.)
This series kind of feels like thunderf00t pandering for views with controversy.
If its about social issues. Usually not very good, or insightful with a few exceptions.
Like most people making their primary income off youtube, he needs to grind out content a couple times a week. Not all of it is gold.
Are you implying nepotism? Would you have said that it was "basically expected" if neither Musk nor his cousins would have been involved in SolarCity?
I'm never sure how I'm supposed to interpret "on paper". Purely on current financials? That seems a poor way to plan IMO. There seem to be quite a few ways to market to each others customers and provide a more comprehensive "package" with this deal. I imagine we'll see car + powerwall + solar packages marketed directly soon.
I guess it's just good luck for him that his interests did somehow connect together really well.
Because the Tesla battery is 60 kW, so its basically like 10 Powerwalls that you can drive around. Instead of storing it on the wall in your garage, it is lying horizontal in the car.
Sort of amazing that people are not making this connection.
The PowerWall is designed to be cycled daily while the car is expected to be cycled weekly.
There is also a danger of electrocution and regulatory hurdles.
Edit: Since this is an all-stock deal, the valuation and hence price is going to float based on TSLA's price, at a ratio of .11 * TSLA = SCTY price.
The lease is probably the most popular. Until there is some sort of expandable DIY option that you can gradually grow out, I think the only really popular way to sell these systems will be either baked in to the mortgage or with leases and creative financing. The lease and financing does seem to frighten a lot of people though, SolarCity modeled loan payments off energy use and in the contract there is even a clause that says if there is a prolonged non-sunny period, you might owe a large chunk on the loan when it comes due...
For Tesla and Solar City the overhead could come from simply not operating similar enough companies to allow much in terms of integration. In the longer term it could even cost money.
Such talk is usually just a way to butter up investors ahead of a deal, it's just part of the sales process.
That's what Tesla is probably hoping for anyway, I highly doubt it will work out quite that nicely. This seems like a highly risky acquisition from a financial perspective for both companies.
Look, I could not help but make that stupid joke when it fits so well.