
How Did GM Create Tesla’s Dream Car First? - jseliger
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/09/15/technology/how-did-gm-create-teslas-dream-car-first.html
======
codeulike
Tesla fans (e.g over at r/teslamotors) are watching the Chevvy Bolt with
interest. Persuading other manufacturers to make electric cars is, after all,
consistent with Tesla's mission (accelerate the advent of sustainable
transport...). I think the Bolt looks really good, and the recent range
announcement is really exciting. I still can't quite believe it is happening,
it seems like GM might still mess it up somehow. Will they make the Bolt in
large enough numbers? Will the dealerships bury the car and fail to promote it
properly? It will be really interesting to see how the launch goes.

~~~
codeulike
Also: The Bolt is rumoured to have a 60kwh pack, I'd be interested to know how
GM are building those at that price point.

~~~
JoelBennett
A special deal with LG, because they are the one making the packs? I suspect
LG gave them a discount because they contracted LG to take care of a bunch of
other stuff in the car. A bit like a lost-leader sale. You lose a bit on one
thing, but you gain it back on something else.

~~~
WalterSear
Like, perhaps, their rideshare adventure.

------
S_A_P
Im a fan of what Tesla is doing from a distance. I cant afford any Tesla that
fits my needs at the moment. Im not 100% sold on their viability long term,
but glad that they are in business if at least to spur the incumbents into
innovation.

That said, the Chevy Bolt is not Teslas dream car. That car is ugly, awkward
and poorly conceived. It may check out on the spec sheet but there is no
passion or personality in that car. Tesla is at least trying to build cars
that are desirable as well as efficient, and whether or not they hit the mark,
you can see that they are trying to do that.

I understand there is a demographic out there that doesn't care what their car
looks like, and maybe that is what they were shooting for when they designed
the bolt, but that is not a car I would ever drive. The Model 3 looks upmarket
enough to satisfy aesthetics as well as practicality. The Bolt looks like what
it is, a frankenstein model that had its ICE powertrain swapped with an
electric one. Doing that required design compromises that just don't look
good. This criticism carries over to BMW with their i series as well. The i3
is ugly and poor performing, and the i8 is impractical and expensive.

Until GM/BMW/VW/FCA/Ford/ETC start with a real electric platform designed for
both efficiency and driving dynamics they will never succeed. Part of me
thinks they realize that electrification will largely lead to commoditization
and remove a big chunk of the profits that are derived from ICE
differentiation, and they don't want that.

~~~
pkulak
There are a lot of people (mostly in NA, it seems) who reflexively call every
hatch ugly. I guess. Eye of the beholder, and all. But I'll take a _better_
car over a _prettier_ car every day. And that's assuming that I even think
hatches are ugly, which I don't.

~~~
samcheng
The funny counterpoint to those people is that the Tesla Model S IS a 5-door
hatchback! (Albeit a big one)

It IS possible to make a "better" AND a "prettier" car at the same time. They
aren't mutually exclusive...

~~~
vvanders
Yup, some people get pedantic and call it a "liftback", either way it's got a
ton of usable storage because of it.

~~~
pkulak
It's not pedantic. Liftbacks sacrifice rear visibility and read headroom for
that sedan-like shape.

------
Aqueous
Author seems a bit biased against Tesla, and pro-GM. First off, no mention of
the fact that Elon Musk has said that he wants competitors for Tesla. He wants
the entire market for electric cars to expand (more potential customers for
them, right?), and they have said that they can't do that all by themselves.
This is why he has open-sourced Tesla's patents [1]. Second, the author says
Tesla is reaching the limits of its potential. His evidence is that they are
unlikely to meet Elon Musk's lofty production goals. If Musk gets to half of
his production goals, that will be a huge success. This is how he constantly
drives his company forward - by making huge promises that he knows Tesla will
not meet, but will still be greeted as a giant leap forward.

It's the market's short-termism that has led to this epidemic of 'If you don't
meet our arbitrarily-set profit goals designed to enrich us at the expense of
almost every long-term goal, you are dead to us.' Musk is playing the long
game, not Wall Street's game.

[1] [https://www.tesla.com/blog/all-our-patent-are-belong-
you](https://www.tesla.com/blog/all-our-patent-are-belong-you)

~~~
dogma1138
I haven't seen anything biased against Tesla, GM did pull out a "wonder" a
30,000$ car with 200+ miles range (reportedly longer than the Model 3) which
is fully electric.

The overall sentiment of the article isn't different than other coverage of
the Bolt like from Wired for example:

[https://www.wired.com/2016/01/gm-electric-car-chevy-bolt-
mar...](https://www.wired.com/2016/01/gm-electric-car-chevy-bolt-mary-barra/)
[https://www.wired.com/2016/09/chevrolet-bolt-range-epa-
ratin...](https://www.wired.com/2016/09/chevrolet-bolt-range-epa-rating/)

Effectively GM "beat" Tesla to the punch, while the Model 3 might have some
additional features and luxuries over the Bolt they also won't be available
for the base 30,000$ model. Without Tesla neither the Bolt nor it's
predecessor the Volt would've existed but it doesn't diminish the
accomplishment that GM has pulled off.

Also while it's very nice that Musk has published the Patents it's not exactly
"open-sourcing" them, they were released for "in good faith use" which is
actually a pretty clever strategy that can be used against competition if the
need arises, don't get me wrong this is still a huge deal but this isn't a
pure altruistic move on Tesla's part either.

~~~
eridius
I dunno, when the article said "Tesla fanboys" that seems like a good
indicator that the author is a bit biased against Tesla.

~~~
dogma1138
No, it's a good indicator that there are "Tesla Fanboys" out there, and they
exist and some of them like any other fanboy are pretty fanatical and not all
the time logical.

~~~
eridius
That makes no sense. Declaring that there are "Tesla fanboys" is not proof of
their existence. Sure, I'll grant you they do exist, but they exist for a lot
of different companies/products and are usually a much tinier base of people
than the speaker believes, and almost certainly when someone accuses someone
else of being a "fanboy" they're wrong and are just using that to try and
discredit the other speaker instead of addressing their points.

In this particular case, the author didn't even cite any behavior that
indicates being a fanboy, they're just claiming that anyone who points out
that Tesla's car has more luxury options, can upgrade to the autopilot, has
access to the supercharger network, has brand cachet, and will be more
profitable at scale is a fanboy. All of these are legitimate things to say
about Tesla and do not require some sort of blind devotion to Tesla in order
to point out.

~~~
dogma1138
I've seen them on HN on more than one occasion.

I once dared to make the comment that one day a Tesla battery pack would catch
fire or explode and out of the woods they came with their pitchforks and
downvotes explaining in length like why it can never happen and how safe are
18650's and the Tesla power bank, and the car, and how smooth Elon Musk's skin
is.

About 3 weeks later just that thing happened, a Tesla caught fire due to the
power pack malfunctioning, since then there were 2-3 more similar cases.

There are Tesla and more Elon Musk in general fanboys out there.

And I don't really understand why you are taking offense, no one made those
claims here, no one even argued that there are no advantages to the Tesla.
However those advantages come at a cost, a Model 3 won't be a 30,000 car, it
would be close to it after the rebate, you will have to pay extra for
luxuries, as well as potentially access to the supercharger network.

And I'm not sure about the rest of your arguments, profitability is in
question here, it's doubtful that the Model 3 will be as profitable, infact it
won't be by design, the question would then be how many Model S/X's Tesla can
sale because that would be the limiting factor in it's ability actually ship
Model 3's as those partially fund it.

As for the brand strength, the brand is considerably more limited than what
you think, sure on HN and in a few other circles it has a huge presence but if
you think that in the middle of nowhere America, or the rest of the world
Tesla has a brand presence you are going to be disappointed, most people do
not know what Tesla is. If you ask the average person to name car companies
Tesla is about as likely to be named as Alpina, heck i would be that more
people are aware of Aplina world wide than Tesla.

~~~
eridius
> _[…] and how smooth Elon Musk 's skin is._

It's really hard to take you seriously when you say something like this. If
someone's behavior really is remarkable, then there should be no need to
exaggerate. If you exaggerate, it suggests that maybe your complaint isn't
legitimate.

> _it 's doubtful that the Model 3 will be as profitable, infact it won't be
> by design_

Why do you say that? People seem to be in agreement that GM can sell their car
at a loss because they make up for it in the ability to sell other gas-
guzzling cars. Tesla can't sell their cars at a loss because they don't have
any way to make it up. The people who claim Tesla is losing money on their
cars are doing so by including R&D costs as part of the cost of the car, which
is nonsense. If Tesla sells 10k more cars, they didn't just lose a bunch of
money, they made money on each car. Sure, if Tesla doesn't sell enough to
recoup their R&D then they've taken a loss overall, but the idea is that they
should sell enough cars to make a profit, which they can then plow back into
R&D to make even better cars. And they can take a loss in the short term if it
leads to profitability later, what they can't do is take a loss on each unit
sold.

In fact, if I search for "tesla model 3 profitability" on DDG, the very first
result is a Fox Business article from March saying that a goal of the Model 3
is to be profitable, something the other cars haven't been (I assume here that
it means after taking R&D into account, as opposed to being a loss on each
unit sold) - [http://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/2016/03/31/tesla-
counts-o...](http://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/2016/03/31/tesla-counts-on-
model-3-for-profit.html).

> _If you ask the average person to name car companies_

If you ask the average consumer that cares about electric vehicles, they
probably do know about Tesla. The average person doesn't really care much
about that, beyond maybe thinking that a hybrid car is a good idea (or even
thinking it's a bad idea because those usually compromise on power).

Edit: Corrected "Business Insider" to "Fox Business". Not sure why I mixed
those two up.

~~~
dogma1138
>It's really hard to take you seriously when you say something like this. If
someone's behavior really is remarkable, then there should be no need to
exaggerate. If you exaggerate, it suggests that maybe your complaint isn't
legitimate.

It's also hard to take them seriously, and you to some extent since you
decided to take offense about an issue that no one in this thread even raised,
usually the first sign of "irrationality" is taking offense when not only it
wasn't directed at you, but also wasn't even given to anyone.

>Why do you say that?...

Because even Elon Musk said so, they are banking on the Model S and X to push
the Model 3. Overall the profitability of the Model 3 is still questionable,
they are using very expensive materials and platform even for the base model,
they are betting on state based rebates to keep it close to 30K (which is
risky since those rebates can disappear) and their overall profit margins
would be relying on the people that buy the premium modules and upgrades for
the model 3, as well as of course buying the very expensive Model S and X's
especially the higher end models of those like the P100D.

That's where the money is some Core i3/5s are effectively Xeons (or the
otherway around depending on how you want to look at it) but Intel sells them
for as low as under 100$ while their Xeon counterparts go for 3-5 times the
price, what Tesla is doing is effectively binning and selling very minor
upgrades at very high relative costs (e.g. using Intel again akin to the 6700
vs 6700K same CPU 50$ difference (300 vs 350$) for an unlocked multiplier
which is effectively a microcode patch) which may or may not work for cars.

>If you ask the average consumer that cares about electric vehicles, they
probably do know about Tesla.

This is an utterly irrelevant question to ask if you want to make a change in
the world, even Elon Musk made this same argument, the point of the cars like
the Bolt isn't to sell them to people who want to buy an electric car
specifically but to anyone who wants to buy a car in general.

This is why range and price point are so important, if you are able to bring
an electric car to a range equivalent to a gas car (without refueling) under
the 30,000 price point you have yourself the ability to push for real change
in the automotive industry and more important a real environmental change both
locally and globally.

The whole idea is to make the fact that a car is electric so irrelevant that
it would be akin to asking if a car has power steering in this day and age. So
pretty much when we get to the point of: >The average person doesn't really
care much about that Is when we "win".

~~~
eridius
You're being awfully defensive about this. Yes, I don't like seeing people
throw the "fanboy" word around. It's _always_ meant as an insult, and nearly
always used with the intention of dismissing someone's argument without
actually countering the points made (usually because they can't). I don't get
why you keep trying to accuse me of taking offense at something not directed
at me, as if that's even relevant to the discussion. Did I even ever say I was
offended? I don't think so.

> _Because even Elon Musk said so_

Citation please? I'm not seeing this anywhere. In fact, an article from just 1
week ago talks about how Tesla might achieve GAAP profitability in Q3 -
[https://electrek.co/2016/09/07/tesla-tsla-could-achieve-
gaap...](https://electrek.co/2016/09/07/tesla-tsla-could-achieve-gaap-
profitability-in-q3-says-elon-musk-a-first-in-3-years/)

> _and their overall profit margins would be relying on the people that buy
> the premium modules and upgrades for the model 3_

Isn't that true for all cars? If the optional features didn't improve profit
margins, dealerships wouldn't be pushing them.

> _This is an utterly irrelevant question to ask if you want to make a change
> in the world, even Elon Musk made this same argument, the point of the cars
> like the Bolt isn 't to sell them to people who want to buy an electric car
> specifically but to anyone who wants to buy a car in general._

One of Elon Musk's goals was to push other car manufacturers into making
electric vehicles. The fact that a widely-recognized brand like GM is coming
out with the Bolt is exactly what Elon Musk wanted to happen.

~~~
dogma1138
>You're being awfully defensive about this.

I'm not being defensive at all =) And you were offended, and defensive, you
somehow brought an entire argument about why "doing X isn't fanboyism" when no
one talked about it, the only thing anyone said is that saying that there are
"Tesla Fanboys" doesn't intrinsically mean that some one is biased against
Tesla.

Ironically this entire argument is a litmus test for their existence.

>Citation please? I'm not seeing this anywhere.

Every talk he made about the Model 3, including his plans, eventually the
Model 3 may become profitable, but if you think they'll beat the profitability
of the large car companies you are really off the beat.

>In fact, an article from just 1 week ago talks about how Tesla might achieve
GAAP profitability in Q3 - [https://electrek.co/2016/09/07/tesla-tsla-could-
achieve-gaap...](https://electrek.co/2016/09/07/tesla-tsla-could-achieve-
gaap..).

Did you read the article, they expect profitability before the Model 3
arrives, then it would dip until the Model 3 production kicks into full gear,
this is almost utter contrast to your original claims of the Model 3 being
highly profitable.

The Model 3 won't lose money, but they expect the profits to come from the
add-ons, and the larger profit margins to come from the more expensive Model S
and X's this is in Musk's bloody "Plan".

>One of Elon Musk's goals was to push other car manufacturers into making
electric vehicles. The fact that a widely-recognized brand like GM is coming
out with the Bolt is exactly what Elon Musk wanted to happen.

Which is exactly what I said. The Future of Electric cars isn't Tesla, it
might pave the road there, or help push some companies along, but it would be
out paced by the giants once the EV scene kicks into full gear, that is OK.

I would still rather own a Tesla because I find it the cooler however living
in London considering one costs about as my yearly pre-tax wage (The P90D) and
the fact I won't be able to park it anywhere kinda make it impossible.

If Tesla is really lucky it would have the same impact that Apple had on
mobile phones, maybe it would come to a point where everyone thinks about
Tesla when they think about a "cool car", but still the majority of the world
would be driving something else, EV but something else.

~~~
eridius
No matter how many times you claim I'm offended, that doesn't actually mean I
was offended. Why do you keep making that claim?

> _the only thing anyone said is that saying that there are "Tesla Fanboys"
> doesn't intrinsically mean that some one is biased against Tesla._

Implying that anyone who brings up those legitimate points is a tesla "fanboy"
does in fact imply that you're biased against Tesla. That was my original
point. The author didn't say "There exist Tesla 'fanboys'", instead the author
very strongly implied that anyone trying to defend Tesla is a fanboy (and thus
should be dismissed). You'll notice that after making that list of arguments
in favor of Tesla, the author then proceeded to address _none_ of them. After
all, why should he, when anyone who makes those arguments is obviously a
"fanboy"?

And no, I'm not offended. Why would I be? I'm not a Tesla "fanboy". What I am
is _annoyed_. This kind of behavior is a pet peeve of mine (as are most
attempts to dismiss an argument by evading it instead of addressing the
points), and I bring it up because most people don't, or even leap to defend
this behavior by claiming "but there _are_ fanboys!", even though that
argument relies on a logical fallacy (the existence of fanboys that defend the
company does not mean that anyone who defends the company is a fanboy).

> _Every talk he made about the Model 3_

Again, give me a citation. I've searched and found the exact opposite of what
you're saying, and linked it. You need to give me an authoritative link, just
claiming this repeatedly is meaningless.

> _Did you read the article, they expect profitability before the Model 3
> arrives, then it would dip until the Model 3 production kicks into full
> gear, this is almost utter contrast to your original claims of the Model 3
> being highly profitable._

Yes I did read the article. And first off, I never claimed it would be "highly
profitable", please don't put words in my mouth. And secondly, you apparently
either don't understand the article or don't understand my argument. Tesla's
going to have a dip because of _capital expenditures_. These aren't per-unit
costs. I said Tesla cannot sell cars at a per-unit loss (which is what I've
seen a lot of people claiming over the past year), because they don't have any
other way to make it up. But GM can sell the Bolt at a per-unit cost (whether
they actually are is irrelevant, I'm not sure we'll know that unless GM tells
us) because selling the Bolt allows them to sell more profitable gas-guzzling
cars and still meet fuel-economy standards, which is something the article
itself even admitted.

> _if you think they 'll beat the profitability of the large car companies you
> are really off the beat_

Literally nobody has made this argument. I do not appreciate being made into a
straw man.

~~~
dogma1138
>No matter how many times you claim I'm offended, that doesn't actually mean I
was offended. Why do you keep making that claim?

Because you've kicked off something that wasn't even discussed.

>Implying that anyone who brings up those legitimate points is a tesla
"fanboy" does in fact imply that you're biased against Tesla.

No one was implying anything, no one was saying anything negative or positive
about Tesla.

> Every talk he made about the Model 3

I'm pretty sure you can use Google and hear him talk when he says that the
Model 3 couldn't happen without the Model S ;) Like the launch event where he
said that the people who buy the Model S effectively are paying the way
forwards for the Model 3.

I'm also pretty sure when you know that Model 3 owners have to pay for
everything including access to the Supercharger network it's not the same as
the Model S.

>Yes I did read the article. And first off, I never claimed it would be
"highly profitable"

>Literally nobody has made this argument. I do not appreciate being made into
a straw man.

You claimed it would be more profitable than the traditional car companies at
scale.

"Tesla's car has more luxury options, can upgrade to the autopilot, has access
to the supercharger network, has brand cachet, and will be _more profitable at
scale is a fanboy_ "

~~~
eridius
> _Because you 've kicked off something that wasn't even discussed._

How do you think things get discussed? Because someone brings them up.
Congratulations for pointing out the origin of literally every discussion ever
made.

> _I 'm pretty sure you can use Google_

Seriously, give me a link or shut up. When I ask for a citation, you can't
just tell me to Google for it. That's not a citation, and I've already
explained that when I search I find many articles that contradict your claim
and none in support.

> _You claimed it would be more profitable than the traditional car companies
> at scale._

No, not "than the traditional car companies". More profitable _than it is at
launch_. And this argument comes straight from the article, it's not actually
my argument, I only rephrased it for brevity:

> _And when its battery factory is running at scale, it should be able to
> produce batteries at a lower price, bumping up its profitability._

------
RankingMember
This article insinuates GM is beating Tesla to the punch on the "everyman"
electric car as though it's some big surprise that an auto manufacturing giant
is able to produce something at scale much quicker than a scrappy upstart. The
bigger story is that it took this scrappy upstart and its "[c]ocky
billionaire" CEO for this lumbering behemoth to inch their rudder 1 degree
away from cranking out SUVs.

~~~
objclxt
> as though it's some big surprise that an auto manufacturing giant is able to
> produce something at scale much quicker than a scrappy upstart

I'm not sure I'd call Tesla a "scrappy upstart". They're a publicly traded
company with a market cap of $28B, versus GM's $47B. They employ 14,000
people. That's a lot less than GM, but it's also not an insignificant amount.
At what point does one stop being a scrappy upstart, and start being a mature
company?

~~~
codeulike
Tesla is truely both an upstart and a startup. They are barely 10 years old
and its only in the last 3 years that they've produced more than 10,000 cars a
year. Their huge market cap reflects their huge plans, not their current
state.

~~~
FireBeyond
"Barely 10" \- the company was founded over 13 years ago, and Musk had been
talking about it for a few years prior.

It may not seem like much of a difference, but when you're trying to spin as a
new arrival...

Similar to the DPR / Silk Road case, where Ross's attorneys tried to paint him
as "just a young kid making some silly mistakes". "Youthful indiscretion".

Ross was about to turn thirty.

Not the "same" thing, but how many teenagers do you know who wouldn't be
offended by being called "barely 10"?

~~~
codeulike
13 = barely 10 is OK in my book, when we're comparing to GM which is 108 years
old.

~~~
serge2k
You mean barely 80 years old right?

------
6DM
If I'm going to buy an electric car, I don't want to buy a hatchback or
something weird looking.

Compare this: [http://blogs-
images.forbes.com/brookecrothers/files/2016/01/...](http://blogs-
images.forbes.com/brookecrothers/files/2016/01/chevy-bolt-front-small.jpg)

to this:
[https://www.tesla.com/sites/default/files/images/model-3/gal...](https://www.tesla.com/sites/default/files/images/model-3/gallery/gallery-1.jpg?20160401)

In my opinion that's why Tesla has big fans. It's not because people are
rallying around the "little guy", it's because we want a car that looks nice
and actually has technology from this decade in it.

Edit: I don't mean to knock on the hatchback in particular. I can't articulate
it, but this car just communicates the typical EV look. As opposed to
something more serious imo.

~~~
w0utert
The Bolt looks exactly like about half of the cars on the road here
(Netherlands, but it's about the same anywhere else in Europe), that alone
should be a pretty good indicator of its potential. I'm not so sure things
would be different in the US, maybe they need to make a saloon at some point
but other than that most cars I've seen on the road in the US are hideous as
well...

As an aside, I personally think the Model 3 is absolutely hideous to look at.
The Model S is very good-looking on the outside but not more so than most non-
EV saloons in the higher segment. I don't think 'good looks' are going to save
Tesla.

~~~
6DM
In my opinion, if you want to win over people who think ev's are a joke, the
car at least needs to look good. It can't be another wonky toy that a large
company threw out there for PR points. The car looks like something they're
taking seriously.

Plus, Tesla's usually have a lot of technology packed in them as well. So it's
not just good looks that are going to save them.

~~~
w0utert
>> _It can 't be another wonky toy that a large company threw out there for PR
points. The car looks like something they're taking seriously._

I agree, but my point was that the Bolt actually _does_ look like something
people take seriously, as demonstrated by the fact that the roads here are
crowded by cars that look exactly the same. I'm 100% convinced that if you
took a Bolt for a drive here, almost no-one would even notice it. It may
surprise car enthousiasts, but that's a very powerful property of car design
in the mid-range segment.

I never understood why hatchbacks are so unpopular in the US, maybe that's the
reason you think it looks like a 'wonky toy'?

------
samfisher83
Everyone should watch the documentary: who killed the electric car

People loved the EV1. It had its limitation due to the battery tech at the
time. If they had kept up the program up we would probably have a
$35000/200Mile electric car by now.

~~~
maxerickson
Could that GM afford to keep the program running? It went out of business 8
years ago.

I also wonder how much impact selling money losing electric vehicles would
really have had on battery research (vastly better batteries are the big
difference between 2002 and now...).

~~~
jtrip
The documentary mentioned above implies that the car was killed, not because
it was uneconomical, because the law that insentivised them to make the car
wasn't worked out properly and the car companies found killing the law
insidiously, and the car, a better option than complying with it.

The company truly was enthusiastic about the electric car, but then the law
played unfavourable and they had to kill it.

~~~
maxerickson
Yeah, but it was massively uneconomical. They were leasing it for less than
$500 a month and producing it at a cost higher than $50,000. Of course people
thought that was great.

------
0xCMP
I'm really rooting for Tesla here. "Tech start-ups", like Tesla, are
disrupting lots of companies that have been doing seemingly nothing for
consumers because they haven't needed to or, when they did, things it were
half-assed.

Tesla is much an example of how Tech People can make things better. What makes
me worried is they're not taking the high road. They're pumping out cars and
not following the smart approaches. They're making mistakes that have already
been made (thats not innovation or iterating fast...). They may screw up the
narrative.

I'd still rather use my ok Honda Civic while I wait for a Model 3 in the
future than get the Bolt.

~~~
cowsandmilk
Tesla is a "tech startup" that cannot even include support for Android Auto or
CarPlay.

~~~
0xCMP
Yea I also have my issues with Tesla. I'm rooting for them, but I'm hoping
they fix the obvious problems they have too.

------
gregwtmtno
The author docks Tesla for being unable to meet demand for its Model 3 and
notes that GM will easily meet demand for its Bolt. No mention of what that
demand is likely to be.

I don't have pre-order stats, but if Bolt sales are anything like Volt sales,
which recently crossed 100,000 after years on the market, meeting demand
shouldn't be that challenging.

[http://media.chevrolet.com/media/us/en/chevrolet/home.detail...](http://media.chevrolet.com/media/us/en/chevrolet/home.detail.html/content/Pages/news/us/en/2016/aug/080116-volt.html)

~~~
WorldMaker
There are no preorder stats for the Bolt because GM doesn't do preorders. Bolt
sales start this year when they arrive in dealerships. It's quite possible
that Bolt sales (actual cars in actual dealerships) can (will?) eat into Tesla
Model 3 preorders, especially because they may be "car keys in hand" well
before the Model 3 wait list catches up to many potential buyers.

Also, comparing Volt sales to Bolt sales is a bit like comparing Model S sales
to Model 3 sales; different target markets and different price points
entirely. At this point I don't think anyone has a good idea (except for
projections that may or may not be accurate) what the Bolt demand will be
until the Bolts start showing up in dealerships soon.

------
NDizzle
By the time the Tesla 3 is generally available these Bolts will be available,
used, with unsexy GM depreciation. I look forward to picking one up then.

If you're curious what unsexy GM depreciation is, check out used Volt prices.
Here's what I found in 20 seconds of searching:
[https://www.cars.com/vehicledetail/detail/675207037/overview...](https://www.cars.com/vehicledetail/detail/675207037/overview/)

------
reacharavindh
Isn't GM the same company that knew about a faulty(possible fatal
implications) ignition system and let it be because it wasn't cost effective
to fix it publicly? I grew wary of GM the moment I read that news and watched
Jon Stewart butcher them on Daily Show. I'd buy a Tesla definitely for their
effort to improve safety more than the "coolness/tech" factor. If only I had
so much money.

... flies away from HN to do the daily job ...

------
samcheng
The New York Times has a longstanding anti-Tesla bias.

[http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/automobiles/stalled-on-
the...](http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/automobiles/stalled-on-the-ev-
highway.html)

[http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/11/business/tesla-motors-
mode...](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/11/business/tesla-motors-model-s-
suspension.html)

[http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/02/business/a-fatality-
forces...](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/02/business/a-fatality-forces-tesla-
to-confront-its-limits.html)

Personally, I think we need as many Electric Vehicles as possible, so my kids'
kids will be able to swim in the coral reefs and climb glaciated peaks. I
don't care much for the hit pieces - I want BOTH Tesla AND GM to succeed.

------
samch
I'd argue that these comparisons, while obvious to make, are missing an
absolutely critical piece of Tesla's long-term plan: autonomous driving
capability. This article and others are merely drawing comparisons based on
price and range.

GM has fielded electric cars off and on for 20 years now (going back to the
EV1). The field is maturing quickly, but the Bolt and other cars like it are
really just electric versions of existing ICE platforms. In the case of the
Bolt, it's the same platform as the Buick Encore and Chevy Spark in the US.
There are very few platform-specific updates that serve to differentiate the
Bolt from its siblings. That's not a criticism in and of itself, but it serves
as an illustration of how GM's approach differs dramatically from Tesla's.

What Tesla is doing by creating entirely new platforms is ensuring that they
are engineered not just to be electric vehicles but - more importantly - to be
autonomous vehicles. This article is overlooking just how important that
functionality will be in Tesla's vision for the Model 3 (and all of their
other future offering). Musk has made no secret of this. So, no, the Bolt is
not Musk's White Whale.

------
pmarreck
Without supercharging infrastructure, this vehicle will be bound to relatively
short distances and then a long charge time.

I'm glad there's a bit of competition, though.

~~~
codeulike
I think there's going to be an SAE combo option for the Bolt, which will mean
about 90 miles range recharged in 30mins. Not as good as the Tesla
supercharger, but not terrible.

edit: coverage is good in europe but not so good in the US from what people
are saying elsewhere in this post

~~~
pmarreck
The US is behind on charging infrastructure, largely because gas is so
::cough:: subsidized ::cough:: cheap.

Superchargers are, more or less, the only game in town. There's apps that tell
you where other types of charges are though, like ChargePoint stations.

------
EdgarVerona
I don't see how this is getting "his wish, in the worst way".

Wasn't one of their stated goals "to accelerate the advent of sustainable
transport?" ([https://www.tesla.com/blog/all-our-patent-are-belong-
you](https://www.tesla.com/blog/all-our-patent-are-belong-you))

It sounds like that goal is finally starting to become successful. We should
all be grateful at the economic pressure Tesla applied to change the market. I
hope that our next milestone is to see more EV sold than Combustion vehicles.

------
rch
It's really not surprising that established manufacturers can create
worthwhile products if they choose to, it is just that they typically won't
bother to try.

~~~
nbarbettini
Exactly. What this article misses is that part of Tesla's stated goal is to
force the hands of established manufacturers into doing precisely this. As
much as the author wants to paint this as a win for GM and an upset for Tesla,
the Bolt is a win for both.

------
Corrado
I think the automakers, and the business reports, are missing the point of the
Tesla (again). They think it's about simply making a car that has a better
{thing} than Tesla, whether that is range or the size of the touchscreen or
even the number of cars they can pump out. It's not. There is a reason that
Tesla had 400,000 pre orders for the Model 3 and it's not because it has a
cool key. Tesla is bringing all of the pieces together in a way that no
current automobile manufacturer will. Could an existing car company (Toyota,
Chevy, Porsche, etc.) beat the Tesla at the EV game? Maybe. But I think its
far more likely that we are witnessing a paradigm shift and the existing
companies are like the carriage makers in the early 1900's trying to compete
with the Model T. How many vehicles to you see on the road built by the Frey
Carriage Company?

------
Animats
Quit grumbling about the Bolt's exterior form factor. GM is starting with
something mainstream. As the article mentions, the Bolt is being built on the
same Gamma platform line as gas cars. There are about a dozen cars built on
the Gamma platform, and they're selling well. GM can put different sheet metal
on top of electric drive if they see a market.

The real achievement is range. GM finally got good range at a low price point.
That's what's needed to make electric cars go mainstream.

(YC-type business opportunity: get public charging points to report their
status (available, in-use, broken) and transmit that to cars and phones. There
are maps of charge points, but not enough status info.)

Tesla no longer deserves a market cap half that of GM.

------
nedsma
GM Chevy Bolt or Opel/Vauxhall Ampera-e should help with the electric car
adoption in the US and Europe which I look forward to. While TM3 may be worth
waiting, Tesla is going to be slow meeting the domestic demand, not to start
going internationally. Affordable, high mileage electric cars is what we need
to speed up the transition from ICE powered cars to electric ones. Apart from
Nissan Leaf, BMW i3 or Volkswagen e-Golf are not really helping much this
segment (source:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQelhFzK3Po](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQelhFzK3Po),
translated "The electric car fairy tale"), so it's awesome to see an
affordable, high mileage electric car.

------
_ph_
I think it is great that the Bolt exists. We need as many as possible electric
car offerings. And I do think that Elon Musk also welcomes more electric cars
from other manufacturers. The article is a bit negative about Tesla though. It
is obvious that a car manufacturing giant like GM could bring a car quicker to
production than a small company like Tesla. It also seems, that GM is just
responsible for the bodywork and suspension, anything electric seems to be of
LG make. There are also rumors, that the production is limited to 20-50k cars
per year. So much less than Tesla is already building, and an order of
magnitude less than planned for the Model 3.

------
whamlastxmas
Seems to be a pretty obvious piece of advertising. As I recently commented
elsewhere, I really want there to be non-Tesla options at this price point,
but GM:

-Probably won't have anywhere as good of warranty service

-Probably has a much less nice interior

-Probably has much worse control and media electronics for the driver

-Probably isn't nearly as fast

-Lacks access to the Tesla superchargers

-Doesn't have advanced features like Autopilot

-Won't receive anywhere near the same level of ongoing software support and updates

For only potentially $5k less, I'll pass. GM has in no way made a competitive
alternative to the new Tesla.

~~~
mrfusion
Don't forget safety!

------
serge2k
Without reading the article, I'm gonna go with "100+ years of experience
designing and building cars".

------
jlebrech
you mean this car?
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5dpQaakHwI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5dpQaakHwI)

