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Comment by Retric | Hacker News Reader

It’s not just control but also reputation. The Tesla founders Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning, got kicked out and then almost completely ignored for their contributions. There’s was even a lawsuit around who got to call themselves founders.

Not everyone is going to care about that stuff, but many do.

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Tangentially related to the main discussion here, but what level of reputation do Martin and Marc deserve. Technically they did found the company, but they weren’t instrumental in making it a household name, especially since they were fired long before it reached its breakout success.

Even if you don’t like Musk, attributing Tesla to them is silly. Roadster, Model S, Model X made Tesla a niche luxury car company (and they both were only involved in the Roadster, the least successful car of the 3) Model 3 and Y made Tesla one of the world’s most valuable companies, especially model Y turning out to be the best selling car in the world in all categories this year. There are tons of engineers, designers in Tesla that you can attribute its success to without going back 20 years to attribute Tesla to Martin and Marc just to spite Musk. Joe Straubel, ex CTO who has been with Tesla since its earliest days is one example. In fact Tesla’s worst days by far happened during ramping up model 3, where it went extremely close to bankruptcy during mid 2017-2018. The founders had no role in pulling them through this or Teslas subsequent journey from being the most shorted stock in the stock market to a 100X increase in stock price in 2020. Which is why I find the talking point that Musk didn’t really found Tesla to be silly, Musk was heavily involved when Tesla actually became a company everyone’s talking about, it doesn’t matter whether he founded it or not.

It’s clear that without Martin and Marc Tesla wouldn’t exist. They started both The Roaster and Model S (WhiteStar) and set the company’s trajectory to follow declining battery prices.

Musk’s influence however needs to be judged in context. He’s made many decisions that seriously harmed the company such as bailing out solar city and other that have kept things growing. So would Tesla have been better off without him? That’s a question he doesn’t want anyone to ask and being thought of as a founder is one way to sidestep those questions.

And without Musk, Tesla wouldn’t exist. Martin and Marc wouldn’t have a company today without signing on Elon, who, like them, tried AC Propulsion’s tzero (another entity without which Tesla wouldn’t exist) and wanted to turn it into a production vehicle. Without AC Propulsion separately rejecting the visions of both Martin and Elon, the two may never have met.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/AC_Propulsion_tzero

Tzero had major timing issues. They used lead acid batteries which were too heavy to offer long ranges and at the time lithium ions just couldn’t hit a reasonable price point. Worse they couldn’t wait around for batteries to get better. Thus the company gave up on trying to get into production for basic economic reasons.

Tesla was founded so roughly 5 years down the line when they could start roadster production battery technology would ready for the ultra enthusiasts. With a luxury sedan to hit a few years later.

As to Musk’s role he wasn’t involved in seed funding, was the largest but not only Series A investor, and became the 3rd CEO 6 months after the roadster entered production and 6 months before the Model S was unveiled. So he may have influenced the Model S, but it was well into development at that point. The company may have been less successful without his involvement, but it would have likely gotten both the Roadster and Model S into production.

What if they had had a different investor?

Was the original Tesla Roadster made by them using an AC induction motor?

I literally don't know. However, that's where I'd draw the line between who deserves credit. If it was Musk's idea, he deserves it. If it was them, then they do. Because that seems to me to be the major innovation. Also, if stationary storage devices started with them, then I'd argue their long-term plan was probably better than Musk's. However, I don't know who started that either. It just seemed like the long-term plan was to use eco-conscious rich people to finance storage innovations that would make the overall grid much more efficient through stationary solutions.

Elon Musk wasn't the sole visionary of Tesla?

Or PG turns up with Aaron Swartz and says "he's one of your founders now" and when he dies, you can stop saying it.

please tell me exactly and explicitly what the founders of tesla contributed

Looks like over the five years they were there they founded it, got it funded, and got them through the first car creation and delivery: the roadster. Pretty big deal, I didn’t actually know that much about these two but that’s incredibly impressive. Thanks for giving me a reason to do some research on the topic.

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Martin-Eberhard-and-Mar...

They were out by the time roadster entered production. Musk provided the first financing round, and became pretty involved since the beginning of designing the roadster. Pretty good story on it here[1]

[1]: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2007/05/tesla200705?currentP...

Hi, Elon?

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