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Comment by Sohcahtoa82 | Hacker News Reader

I must be missing something because I'm not sure why this matters when Tesla has made their patents open. Can't someone else make a car that can use a Tesla supercharger? Why wouldn't another manufacturer make their cars compatible with Tesla's charging network, then sell that as a massive feature?

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Tesla's network is not open-access, there is authentication involved so that even if you implement the physical standard you can't use their chargers without their consent.

Tesla has indeed offered to share the Supercharger network, with anyone who is also willing to split the cost.

You cannot just plug in and get charge with the right adaptor. You need to be authorized by the billing software to get juice. This happens automatically when you plug in a Tesla to the charger.

I figured there'd be a billing issue to sort out, and that Tesla might even charge a non-Tesla a little more to use their chargers, and maybe other manufacturers really don't like the idea of giving their competition money, but...c'mon. Certainly you could sell a lot more cars if you advertised being able to use Tesla's network, even if you had to pay a small premium to use it.

I believe the offer is any car maker who wants to use it has to pay for half of the whole infrastructure / build out cost for the network.

No way someone can come in and use the network and just pay the cost of electricity, or even a premium on the electricity.

Tesla is going to want someone to share the cost of building it out. Of course since they sell way more EVs by quantity, it would benefit them more than anyone who might come and offer to split the cost. Which is why no one will take them up on it until they can see a way to selling 6 digit quantities of EVs.

> Tesla has indeed offered to share the Supercharger network

Tesla should standardize on CCS like everyone else has and enter into billing agreements with the other charging networks. That's what Electrify America and ChargePoint have done:

https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/electrify-america-chargep...

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