Tesla Motors
Co-founded by South African Elon Musk, Tesla Motors is a Nasdaq listed company based in Fremont, California, USA that designs & manufactures electric cars.
Surprisingly, whilst Tesla Motors is currently producing approximately 30,000 cars per annum, it has yet to realise a profit. In fact Elon Musk forecasts that by the year 2020 the company would be selling 500,000 vehicles and at that sales level the company should be realising a profit – and by 2025 it would be making a few million vehicles which would rival BMW.
To put Tesla Motors’ financial performance into perspective, the company had generated a revenue of $2.25 billion in the first nine months of 2014, which was an encouraging increase of 60% from the previous year.
However the net loss for the same period more than trebled to just over $185 million.
Despite the financial outlook & competition from cars like Chevrolet’s Bolt & Nissan’s Leaf, Elon Musk’s energy & passion for producing electric cars remains unwavering which was demonstrated at a recent press conference during a motor show in Detroit he said the three main motor manufacturers needed to increase their investment in EV’s (Electric Vehicles) to at least 250,000 EV’s per year.
His driving force is to make ensure real environmental benefits which he maintains will only come about when the big car companies commit to making electric vehicles in spite of the competition it would create for his own Tesla Motors company.
Obstacles To Selling Tesla Electric Cars
Apart from the competition, one of the main obstacles to selling EV’s is the issue of their range – they can only go so far before they run out of electricity & their batteries run flat.
Nissan’s new Leaf model which will be available in 2017 is set to manage over 300 km on a single charge which is encouraging & could set a new benchmark for EV’s.
Tesla press conf at 9am on Thurs. About to end range anxiety … via OTA software update. Affects entire Model S fleet.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 15, 2015
To counter this Tesla Motors has started building recharging stations at motorway service stops which currently exist in California, Germany, Norway and planned for the UK in a partnership with Dale Vince, the founder of Ecotricity.
Taking it a step further these stations have become super-charging stations to help recharge their EV’s in a far faster time than normal charging would take.
Another threat to the future of electric cars is the recent decrease in the price of oil which recently dropped to below $45 a barrel which is the lowest in 5 years – a long way off the $100+ a barrel of recent times.
Musk agrees that this factor discourages cost conscious motorists from investing in electric cars but hopes that the huge environmental awareness drive & benefits may encourage people to opt for the environmentally acceptable, eco-friendly option together with all the tax credits & other benefits that may be available to EV purchasers.
Furthermore, Musk maintains that EV’s are still cheaper to run than fossil-fueled powered cars despite the low oil & fuel prices.
In spite of all the talk of the dwindling demand for EV’s, after 7 years since their first car rolled off the assembly line, Tesla Motors still struggles to produce enough of its electric cars to meet demand – this in spite of never having spent a cent on advertising.