Comment by recuter | Hacker News Reader

Comment by recuter | Hacker News Reader

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> If this concept turns into reality, it's gonna be almost a better (or actually better, depending on your preferences) car than the model y standard range for half the price!

This is magical thinking. Kudos to Volkswagen PR folks what can I say, mission accomplished.

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_Nils (2011)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_Golf_Mk7#e-Golf (2013)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_ID._Buzz (2017)

Are you new to car concept PR shenanigans?

The limiting factor is batteries and being able to produce these things at scale. What Tesla is doing with its gigafactories and approach to batteries is something all the legacy car companies need to be doing and they need to get on that yesterday.

2024/5 is around the time Tesla will have a new range of cars and price drops and I can say this not because of blind optimism in Elon but because the physics and economics are starting to line up to enable that.

For an in-depth analysis take a look at Munro: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fe548XvavY

tl;dr - the right way to build electric cars:

In-house electronics. In-house batteries. In-house motors. 48v wiring. Gigacastings. Gigafactories. Vertical integration.

VW, Toyota, 'etc all have engineers screaming for over a decade about all these things but other than PR fluff they are just not allowed to tackle the problem. Weird, but here we are.

VW has announced this week that they're spending $200B on Gigafactories etc.

https://electrek.co/2023/03/14/vw-doubles-down-ev-strategy-w...

Awesome, best of luck to them, this is the way.

VW has its own battery factory in Spain: https://youtu.be/3TaNKoYLGsQ @11:16 minute mark

> In-house electronics.

Yes and: Software stack.

(Sandy) Munro has mentioned this a few times.

I struggle to imagine other vehicle mfgs successfully making their own software.

My prediction is that one or more mfgs will adopt Apple's stack. Either thru partnership or licensing. Apple has cash to burn, so I think partnership, eg with Stellantis.

Then they'd also get access to Apple's chips.

As you surely know, legacy cars have dozens of electronic control units (ECUs), whereas Tesla has just a few chips/boards. Those ECUs use bespoke chips. And their supply was recently disrupted. Huge bummer.

Two birds, one stone.

> Then they'd also get access to Apple's chips.

Heh, no. Apple has absolutely no interest in becoming a tier 3 OEM supplier in the car industry and don't make those sort of chips to begin with. They are happy to cement their ecosystem by helping car makers integrate it into the infotainment screens but that is a far cry from what Tesla is doing.

But they're fine contracting w/ Stellantis (or equiv) to make their cars.

A distinction without a difference.

PS- What tier is Apple for supplying CarPlay for 100s of makes and models, and expanding.

Nevermind.

Intel & NVIDIA are considered Tier 2. QNX-Blackberry sells to both OEMs and Tier 1.

Rebutting my speculation by suggesting Apple would be a lowly Tier 3. While they're already Tier 1 and seriously considering being an OEM.

You're funny.

Tesla software kind of sucks?

They can't fix their auto wipers. Phantom braking is still a thing. FSD is a scam.

Which OEM has the best software?

(I don't have a dog in this fight.)

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