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Comment by jack-r-abbit | Hacker News Reader

I think this is brilliant on the part of Tesla. If they can get their charging network big enough & fast enough, new comers to the electric vehicle market would be wise to just use (license?) some of the tech needed to also charge their cars on these stations. Depending on how this is structured, Tesla could come out of this getting a piece of every electric vehicle that gets sold using their chargers. Unless the tech here is nothing special.

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Forget whether the tech is something special; it's the value of the real estate. If tesla builds out the supercharger network before anyone else, then they'll be able to license the tech for close to whatever they want, because the cost to build a competitive competing product will be so great, similar to how there's not a lot of new tier 1 internet providers.

I'm not sure Tesla's first-mover advantage here is really going to last. Ultimately, I think it's likely that existing gas stations will slowly start converting to electric charging stations. If they can match Tesla's charging tech, it will even the playing field fairly quickly.

Now if Tesla were to start selling their charging tech to existing gas stations, they might get an even bigger piece of the pie.

Actually, I think putting them into gas stations would be a horrible idea. When was the last time you wanted to sit at a gas station for 20+ minutes to fill your car? They need to put them in places that you are willing to spend a little more time (and quite possibly money) while you charge. Grocery stores, restaurants. I guess they have mostly been putting them in rest stops which also makes some sense along those longer stretches between cities. But while 20 minutes is a great charge time... it sucks to have to sit for 20 minutes if you have nothing to do. It doesn't take me 20 minutes to stretch my legs and have a piss.

I agree with you in principle about the necessity of needing something to do in the meantime, but a huge number of gas stations already have convenience stores attached to them. Perhaps not in bigger cities, but pretty much anywhere where space is not a concern.

ok... maybe "horrible" was too strong of a word. But 20 minutes even with a mini mart attached is too long. Next time you fill up your car, start a timer when you start filling. And then wander around the convenience store until the timer reaches 20 minutes before you can leave. I bet that feels like a life time. :)

The station is not meant for day to day "fillups." It is for long interstate trips... the kind where 30 minutes out walking or having lunch is quite welcome.

We're so used to standard gasoline cars that it can be hard to remember that you never visit a charging station in normal use. You charge your electric car overnight at home.

There are already a good deal of gas stations that fit the supercharger model -- they sell gas, but also have attached restaurants (often fast food, but often up-scale too). Basically the sort of place truckers like to stop -- food and gas in one go.

I would think Tesla would see that as a win, not a loss. Tesla is a car company, not a charging-station company. They're only building supercharger stations because supercharger stations have to exist for Tesla to sell their cars, and nobody else is building them. If gas stations started putting them in it'd mean Tesla could sell their cars without having to deal with the expense and hassle of building out a huge amount of infrastructure.

I see the super chargers (and electric cars in general) more as a way of putting many gas stations out of business. Who will need to ever "fill up" their electric car when they can charge it over night each day? The only time you'll need to charge on the road is on long trips, which is exactly the void that the superchargers fill for Tesla.

Elon was asked about that in the call. Tesla is open to working with other manufacturers, but the superchargers are pretty finely tuned to the battery that Tesla is using. Other manufacturers would have to make their batteries to Tesla's specs for it to work.

>> Other manufacturers would have to make their batteries to Tesla's specs for it to work.

Or buy batteries from Tesla.

I understand the manner in which the battery is put together is a company secret.

I've read that as well, but it's hard to imagine that it can really be that much of a secret. If a competitor wanted to find out how it's put together, all they'd have to do is buy one and take it apart, no?

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