Quote:
Originally Posted by tonybelding
OK, I fail to see how you got from what I wrote to your conclusion.
Are you saying they are lying, that their explanation is bogus? That they really are trying to make more than four cars a week, but for some reason they aren't able to? If so, I'd like to know your source.
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I have heard certain things that at least the supplier I talked to was told (assuming that its true since this is all coming secondhand) and while I cant relate exactly what I was told the general feeling is that what the public is being told vs. what the suppliers are hearing are two different things.
But forget that... let go with what we know... They are producing 4 cars/week so thats $400K/week in gross income. Thats expected to continue until Mid-sept (which really means october if we are lucky) so that means that by october they will have delivered 40 cars for a total of $4,000,000. After that they are planning to ramp from 4/week to 25/week (100/month) in a span of 2 months. The only problem is that even the big automakers arent able to do this. supply chain and personell issues usually allow production to increase by 100% per month. but maybe tesla can move faster because they are smaller and can react more quickly so again lets give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that they can somehow ramp up 400% in october and 400% again in november. that puts their numbers at about 50 cars for october and 80 for november and then 100 every month afterwards. so by the end of 2008 they will have delivered 270 cars and by april 1st 2009 they will have deilvered 570 cars. Of course they havent even made a dollar yet because they have already pre-sold 600 cars.
So basically no new money is going to be coming in until april of 2009. After that every car they sell brings in $100K.... of course thats gross income.. We know at least that they are confident that they can sell the tesla now for a profit but notice how nobody is talking about what that profit is... Thats because they are probably just breaking even on the car.. maybe making a few thousand dollars on each car.
Thats the real point here.. You work the numbers and they just dont add up; Its like the dot com boom all over again. And this is assuming that everything goes right for them and the transmission works and they can line up everything and meet their goals, which honestly is not something that tesla has been very good at. I like the car and I like the idea of a company that makes a really cool electric car, but the business end of it just doesnt make sense.