The biggest lesson is that traditional car companies are obsessed with hardware and ignore software.
Editor’s note: This article is from “Tencent Technology”, review: Cheng Xi, Reprinted with permission.
Toyota has not understood Musk’s unique strategy for a long time, that is, he does not sell car hardware, he is selling an Apple mobile phone with wheels. This tool itself is just a medium to sell the Apple-like iOS ecosystem software he is building.
In 2020, American pure electric car manufacturer Tesla became the most dazzling star in the capital market. Driven by a series of good news and financial reports, Tesla’s stock price has increased by about five times. In the past, people often compared Tesla’s market value with a leading automotive company. Today, Tesla’s market value has surpassed the sum of the world’s largest car company Toyota and the second-ranked German Volkswagen. The industry’s focus has been It is the total market value of Tesla’s equivalent of how many auto companies. According to media analysis and reports, Tesla’s rapid growth also reflects the “snail speed” of the transformation of the traditional auto industry. Tesla has brought lessons to traditional auto giants.
It is reported that Musk, the head of Tesla, has a “weird personality” similar to Howard Hughes. He is a maverick, causing attention and controversy on social media sites, and his posts often make Tess. Pull the stock price to ride a roller coaster. In the process of Tesla’s rise, the outside world is easily distracted by Musk’s words and deeds.
Although sales are only a fraction of the 10 million vehicles sold per year by Toyota in Japan and Volkswagen in Germany, Tesla’s market value is growing rapidly. The most financially valuable automobile company dwarfs the total market value of General Motors, Ford and Fiat Chrysler. Tesla has a market value of approximately US$370 billion, which is equivalent to the GDP of Hong Kong, a major Chinese city. Perhaps this is appropriate, because Tesla is sweeping the Chinese market.
Japan is a big country in the traditional auto industry, but the Japanese market has not yet seen Tesla’s rapid development. Musk had hoped that Japan would become Tesla’s second largest pure electric vehicle market. Of the approximately 380,000 vehicles delivered by Tesla in 2019, Japan’s share of sales is so small that it did not disclose. Some of the reasons include: limited brand recognition, small dealer network, limited after-sales service capabilities, this direct-to-customer sales model is inconsistent with traditional Japanese sales habits.
At the same time, Musk seems to be facing the problem of “John Delore Motors” (a mysterious American car company that will always only produce one car model). Will future generations treat Musk as a reckless performer? Think he has noFrance honors its hyped new models. Obviously, the market-to-sales ratio (the currency value of stock prices and sales) of Tesla shares is not uncommon in Wall Street and Silicon Valley, and they are waiting for the stock price bubble to burst.
Ignore software and programmers
But forget about rising stocks and eccentric founder worship. Tesla’s market value far exceeds that of Toyota, the world’s largest car company. This iconic event illustrates many problems, especially in the field of pure electric vehicles, traditional car companies Why is it stagnant? This is also a lesson Tesla brought.
The biggest lesson is that traditional car companies are obsessed with hardware and ignore software. Toyota has not understood Musk’s unique strategy for a long time, that is, he does not sell car hardware, he is selling an Apple mobile phone with wheels. This tool itself is just a medium to sell the Apple-like iOS ecosystem software he is building.
The data Tesla collects from users, their environment, interests, tendencies, travel habits and behaviors may be more valuable than engines and high-performance batteries. This allows Tesla to polish and improve the customer experience while identifying where the automotive market will turn next.
The heavy burden of the supply chain
In addition, Tesla reminds traditional car companies that disruptive subversion is an “evil force” necessary for long-term development.
Tesla has changed the traditional automotive supply chain model. For example, the company produces its own artificial intelligence chips, and through software upgrades and iterations, it performs performance tests on Model S, Model X and Model 3 models that have been sold and on the road. Upgrade, car owners can always get the surprise of new control functions.
In order to reduce costs and prices, Tesla produces some parts including electric motors. In September, the company will hold a battery day event to announce the technological progress made in the field of automotive lithium batteries. Currently, the company is building a lithium battery production line in the Fremont plant in California, and plans to increase battery production capacity in the Berlin plant in Germany and the Shanghai plant in China in the future.
Musk’s technology is the core of Tesla’s autonomous driving capabilities. This also makes Tesla pay more attention to programmers than engineers. Traditional car practitioners may object to this priority, but there is no doubt that Toyota is already observing Tesla’s approach.
Considering their huge talent pool and huge resources, Toyota, Volkswagen and their traditional counterparts should have no problem catching up with Tesla before 2025. However, automakers in countries such as Japan seem to pay more attention to tradition rather than innovation. Toyota is proud of the global supply chain system it helped create. Every Toyota product contains parts that can create millions of jobs. Large automakers feel obligated to maintain a supply chain system, and Tesla does not have this burden.
We can discuss thisThe advantages of a sense of responsibility of traditional auto companies. However, the fact is that Musk’s actions are not hindered by this mobile parts supply system. By keeping these component functions within the company, Tesla can continue to innovate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and deploy new technologies tomorrow instead of waiting until 2025.
New energy revolution
Tesla also reminded Japan and other traditional automobile countries-the real big money is here: renewable energy. Recently, one of the most important news about Tesla’s cooperation is that Panasonic is investing $100 million in Tesla’s electric car battery production.
It is undeniable that the relationship between Panasonic and Tesla has also been unstable-at least on Twitter. But in 2014, when Musk built his $5 billion battery factory in the Nevada desert, he decided to look for Panasonic to cooperate. Panasonic’s decades of research and development on battery technology are now more valuable than ever.
Panasonic has wisely stepped up its focus on the automotive battery industry, and this business brought Panasonic approximately US$4.5 billion in sales in 2019. Panasonic has no reason not to increase this number by another zero in a short time. Of course, companies in traditional industries can add another two or three zeros to use new energy to improve people’s living standards and economic growth.
One of the challenges faced by large countries like Japan, China, India, and Indonesia is to continue to maintain high economic growth, and new energy brings a huge opportunity. Society can use renewable energy to provide cars, airplanes, ships, Home and commercial buildings provide power.
In the traditional auto industry, some people think that Musk has completely won. Japan, Germany and Detroit will never catch up with Tesla. Frankly speaking, this view is reasonable, but such a threat is also a catalyst for Toyota and its traditional auto counterparts to continuously improve the competitiveness of pure electric vehicles.