Yeah it's more about being willing to cannabalise their existing product lines in favour of EVs, and throw away decades of internal combustion engine (and the associated paraphernalia) know-how, in favour of something new. Pretty terrifying for an incumbent car maker.

Right, hardware people just can't do software (The only exception is Apple). Nokia was making phones then at the last minute picking an OS to bodge in there.

Car companies don't write software, they outsource it.

Musk's first companies were software based, and he doesn't have an existing business to prop up, that's the main advantage.

If he manages to make his one car factory as fast as he predicts it will be able make as many cars as Ford's 30 factories, leaving Ford with 29 worthless factories. He'll need self driving cars just to get them out of the factory fast enough.