Tesla is not a product company
Gerd Saurer
Enthusiast riding the wave of disruption and transformation supporting customers to stay ahead by leveraging technology
Tesla's recent presentation underscores a shift in their identity from a product company to a visionary powerhouse. Maybe they have never been a product company and I am just realizing it now. The CEO, Elon Musk, drives a vision of the future that captivates consumers which is something completely different than selling products that need to be build, sold, maintained.
Why do I believe they are not a product company even they sold so many cars? Based on the numbers of cars the market evaluation is nonsense, from the announcements of the last 5-10 years beardly anything made it into a product and if it did it was delayed by years with less functionality promised. All the products they sell have huge quality issues but nobody cares. Why is that? Because you didn't by a product you bought a vision of a future that you want to be part of. With this in mind customers are not satisfied by a great product but by a evolved vision that they can be part of. The product only becomes a gimmick that you use like other merch with a logo on it that identifies you as being one of the tribe that believes in this future painted by Elon Musk himself.
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Don't get me wrong, there is nothing bad about selling visions - every good movie, TV shows book does exactly that. (There is a reason they have chosen Warner Bros. Studios for the presentation yesterday). In the case of Tesla they even sell a positive vision of the future which is really rare today and needs to be valued. But is selling a vision enough to be in the top companies by Market Cap? I don't know, maybe it does in a world where feelings are more valued than information and people thrive to be part of a defined group that can be against others.
#Tesla #VisionaryLeadership #MarketInnovation #Productmanagment #Future
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4 个月So is Uber a potential competitor or a potential customer now ? What happens to all the former tech employees now that scrape by doing Uber rides ?
Principal Cloud Standards Architect at Microsoft
4 个月The product is roughly on par with the build quality of the old car companies or even surpasses them (have you driven any Chevy, Ford, Jeep or so lately?). Therefore the vision and especially the relentless engineering effort to work towards that vision (even if it might be a lot farther away than they first imagined) is a huge differentiator. What differentiating vision for their products and the future they create do you see from other car makers? Exactly... Nothing. Crickets....
Investor/Advisor/Mentor
4 个月You can’t eat or drive vision.