don't other truck manufacturers that actually know how to build a truck also make electrified models?

There are other electric semi trucks out there, but none (at least as of last year) compare in specs and capabilities. The big issue is their power consumption is much higher than the Tesla Semi which has been repeatedly validated by their testers as even better than what Tesla advertises. Efficiency will be king in this kind of business.

Worse efficiency = less range = more batteries = less load capacity = less money per delivery

E.g this is from DHL

Creating a more sustainable fleet: Could this electric semi be a game-changer?

DHL and Tesla partnered up to test the Semi, Tesla’s cutting-edge electric semi truck, working together toward a new era of long-haul trucking, 18 wheels at a time.

DHL (www.dhl.com)

Over a two-week trial period this summer, DHL Supply Chain USA took a thorough look under the hood of the Tesla Semi, integrating the e-truck into 3,000 miles (5,000 km) of normal operations out of Livermore, California. The trial included one long haul of 390 miles (625 km) – fully loaded with a gross combined weight of 75,000 pounds (34 metric tons) – confirming the Tesla Semi’s ability to carry typical DHL payloads over a long distance on a single charge.

During the trial, the trial vehicle averaged 1.72 kWh/mile operating at speeds exceeding 50 mph (80 km/h) on average for over half its time on the road. The result exceeded our expectations and even Tesla’s own rating.

Putting the Tesla Semi to the test allowed us to validate whether it could travel 500 miles with a fully loaded trailer and see what our drivers thought of the truck’s performance. We were encouraged by how quickly they gained confidence with the vehicle and leveraged the Tesla’s smart features to help improve performance, comfort, and the overall driver experience.

Edit: Just some examples... I don't know if these have been verified in use unlike the Tesla, so all theoretical based on the advertised miles/battery size.

• Mercedes: 1.935 kWh/mile (310 miles)
• Kenworth: 2.5 kWh/mile (200 miles)
• Volvo: 2.05 kWh/mile (275miles)

And those are all shorter range at that.

Edit: I should also add... we don't know the price of the Tesla Semi. Its possible that its ridiculously priced and the increased efficiency is negated even over the life of the vehicle compared to the other trucks. That's a big unknown given these are pilot vehicles.

The interesting thing is, Tesla is perhaps the most obvious and extreme example, but they’re not the only auto manufacturer this is happening to right now. Nissan is in a bit of a tail spin as well.

There are so many problems slamming in to the auto industry right now. Even beyond the tariff instability.

In the US in particular, As cars have gotten more reliable and longer lasting, the market for new “budget” cars has dried up. Car buyers who might have once bought budget are now buying used cars that probably have a good many years left. The sales of new cars have been declining since 2016 but new car price have been skyrocketing, keeping up revenue growth for automakers.

This seemed ideal for automakers as it meant they could drop the lean margins of cheap cars and focus on higher margin markets, which looked much better to shareholders. Those companies that focused on this budget market have suffered, the best example being Nissan. The ideal for automakers is that people will buy “up” the value chain over time, buying higher end or “less used” vehicles when they trade in their old vehicle, going from a twice used, to a once used and eventually to a new car.

This kind of came to a head during the pandemic. Not only was the supply of lower end used vehicles dwindling as less and less entered the market due to less being made a few years back, there was also a shortage of new cars due to supply chain break downs and an increase in demand. Many people were taking out insane financing on massively over priced cars, both new and used. Now a lot of people are underwater on those auto loans from the pandemic because the trade-in/sales price is less way than what they have left on the loan. Many are also defaulting on those insane pandemic auto loans and their repossessed cars are ending up back on the market, increasing supply in the used market.

Many who are underwater on their auto loans but can still make payments can’t afford to make even larger payments, so rolling over the principle from the last loan into a new loan on another car is impractical. So they aren’t buying, let alone moving up the market to buy new or higher end. The demand being suppressed in the used market and the supply being bolstered by repos means used prices are massively depressed. This depressed used market carries over to the new market in turn, as most people buying new probably couldn’t afford to do so without trading in their old car, so a depressed used market hurts their purchasing power. Why would someone buy a new car when the only new one the could afford is probably worse than the existing car.

Tesla is getting a lot of focus because of the political entanglement of their high profile CEO, but the whole industry is under strain. Nissan is frantically looking for buyers to help them out of the debt hole they’re in, and groups like Stellantis (owners of Chrysler, Fiat, Jeep, Ram and Dodge) are desperately chasing new revenue streams as absurd as ads in the central console.

Good riddance. Nazis dont deserve to be rewarded. They deserve the worse of the worse.

Not a single tesla vehicle has ever been profitable as an actual vehicle.

This honestly couldn't be further from the truth.

Tesla's vehicles once ramped have always been extremely profitable (except probably the CyberTruck as it hasn't properly ramped due to low demand)

Any losses you see are due to their aggressive growth involving capital expenditures and research and development. It's not that the vehicle isn't profitable.

The ZEV credits are just bonus money that they can then leverage to expand faster.

Edit: If you want to try and see this another way that might make sense... The Model S and X were very profitable, but they didn't make enough money to fund the expansion for the Model 3 and Y. Ditch the Model 3 and Y, and remain a boutique luxury car company, and they would posted profits instead of losses. It wasn't the cars losing money, it was the growth. The ZEV credits accelerated that growth immensely by giving them more breathing room.

I tried fsd demo this spring and it’s getting pretty good. I wouldn’t use it but it was perfect on well marked roads. The thing is it made me realize just how poorly maintained our roads are and everything is an edge case. For example it didn’t stay in lane at one Intersection but the intersection was a weird offset plus the lines were all faded away. Although I also disnt give it any chance to recover so I suppose it could have been ok: Im not risking it not recovering

It might surprise everyone but mostly by staying in a well maintained well mapped area, like Waymo did. There’s no way it fulfills the claim of self-driving everywhere without more improvements

The robots is will have the next generation computer and higher resolution cameras which may help. However that also allows more overhead for the next ai update

The Nazis actually made good cars. Tesla is all the worst parts without the good cars.

...nah man, that's on the domestic dealers + automakers choosing not to market small affordable cars in favor of big profitable road-tanks, and it's not the first time they've priced themselves out of the market like this...

You have just argued against the article itself. Should we believe you?

I get what you mean but it's still stuck at level 2 and it always will be. No matter how good it is, if you move your eyes from the road, it will eventually kill you. Cameras alone are not sufficient enough for autonomous driving.

The article doesn't say they've never made a profit on any of their cars. If that's what you got from that, you should try reading it again.

Also, if you make 1 billion in profit on something, and then spend 2 billion researching and developing and setting up a factory to build a new product, you end up with a loss of 1 billion. That does not mean your first thing is unprofitable. This is pretty basic stuff.

The vehicles are profitable, they just didn't provide enough profit this quarter to cover their R&D and capital expenditures for growth.

Edit: Sorry, and in case it wasn't clear, their R&D and capital expenditures dwarf the ZEV credits every quarter.

Cameras alone are not sufficient enough for autonomous driving.

I disagree with this assertion, because they’re correct that the only being that can currently drive is relying on vision. Vision alone is sufficient for driving.

But autonomous driving really hasn’t succeeded yet. We still have no idea what is required for autonomous driving or whether we can do it at all, regardless of sensors.

So you’re implying that we can definitely do autonomous driving but can’t do it the way humans do, whereas I say we won’t know the requirements until we find some that succeed, and we may never

Yeah sure. If you want the same bad results as humans deliver, in terms of crash rates, than it's possible. I wouldn't trust it. Also human vision and processing is completely different from computer vision and processing.

Presumably we have the intelligence to set requirements before something can be called self-driving - that’s usually what the fuss is about, whether the marketing is claiming it’s something it’s not.

If they fail with their approach, I’m fine with that, just like I’m fine if Waymo fails with their approach. Of either succeeds, why should I care how? Obviously there’s a problem if it runs over some old lady at a stop sign and drags them down the street but that’s clearly a failure for them

Presumably we have the intelligence to set requirements before something can be called self-driving

We already have that https://www.sae.org/blog/sae-j3016-update

Volkswagens aren't that great but I get your point.

Good thing I didn't use the word great, and I'm talking about the cars they made in the 30s and 40s hence the past tense of "made."

The thing is humans are horrible drivers, costing a huge toll in lives and property every year.

We may already be at the point where we need to deal with the ethics of inadequate self-driving causing too many accidents vs human causing more. We can clearly see the shortcomings of all self driving technology so far, but is it ethical to block
Immature technology if it does overall save lives?

Maybe it’s the trolley problem. Should we take the branch that leads to deaths or the branch that leads to more deaths

It’s a fundamental and inevitable outcome of how these businesses are structured and run. Were the decisions to chase larger more premium vehicles short sighted? absolutely. Was the pursuit of Financialization in car sales to make up for pricing out lower income buyers obviously a bad idea? Without a doubt. Could they have made any other decisions? Not without being replaced by shareholders.

The solution to this problem is not just to “kick the bums out”, these companies need to have their management and ownership restructured in a way that generates incentive structures to maintaining a stable long term market rather than quarterly revenue growth.

Some companies, like Nissan, didn’t pursue the big premium trend and they got burnt as well, largely because the trends of the rest of the market and surplus of used cars is undermining their new sales. To some extent their choice to so heavily pursue sales to fleets like rental companies didn’t help.

The original Beetle (at least the ones I worked on from the 1950s and 60s) didn't have stellar product quality, but it was well-engineered to be maintainable by someone without specialist knowledge or tools. VWAG has definitely gotten worse at quality over the following decades.