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The Buffalo News in upstate New York reports
Tesla Motors is changing its name, as the SolarCity owner branches out into solar energy.
The California-based company will become Tesla Inc., according to a regulatory filing on [February 1].
The name change reflects Tesla's evolution from a company that makes electric cars to one that now seeks to be a renewable energy powerhouse, with products ranging from electric vehicles to battery storage and solar energy. The business includes the sprawling SolarCity solar panel factory in South Buffalo that is set to open this summer.
Some additional details are available in a story at Inc :
Tesla Motors isn't just a car company.
That's been true for some time, as Elon Musk's firm has pushed its way into the energy sectorover the past two years.
But now the company is making it official. A new SEC filing on Wednesday revealed that the company will change its name from Tesla Motors to Tesla Inc. The filing was first spotted by Business Insider.
The move is indicative of Tesla's changing business model since Musk co-founded it in 2006. Initially a maker of high-end electric sports cars, Tesla has shifted into energy products like solar panels and home batteries. It also agreed to acquire SolarCity, which Musk co-founded, in November for $2.3 billion.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by n1 on Friday February 03 2017, @07:14PM
those articles, some real balanced and considered reporting there....
only way they could have gone further is to call musk the messiah.
I really wish people would get off elon's dick for 5 minutes, his businesses are the perfect symbol of crony capitalism.
like the products all you want, but do not buy into this revolution and disruptor bullshit, it's all marketing.
(Score: 3, Funny) by takyon on Friday February 03 2017, @07:20PM
Musky has reached a level beyond mere mortals. He is now the Trump Whisperer (Mars-oriented, non-Bannon variety).
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 03 2017, @08:46PM
From half a century ago, I'm reminded of a cartoon muskrat. [google.com]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 4, Interesting) by bob_super on Friday February 03 2017, @07:45PM
Well, compared to cable companies, mil-indus rent seekers or bankers, there's value in his companies making new things which genuinely advance the state of the art, and deliver it on an industrial scale.
Even if Tesla Motors is too big-brotherish for my taste, at least they don't have yet a track record of cheating and covering up, instead delivering updates and improvements to products they already got paid for. That's a refreshing concept, when everyone else is out to screw you to make the quarter.
(Score: 2) by n1 on Friday February 03 2017, @10:33PM
As i said in my original comment... You can like the products all you want, but the TSLA business model is not something anyone else can replicate or compete with, and it has absolutely no trajectory to making positive cash flow and profit making. Musk is always kicking the can down the road with the next big idea which is going to require a few more billion capex.
"Tesla does not ever need to raise another funding round" - Musk Feb 2012
Sep 2012 - $192m
May 2013 - $913m
Feb 2014 - $2bn
Aug 2015 - $652m
May 2016 - $2bn
They turned a profit in one quarter recently, by shifting a years worth of ZEV credits -- other manufaturers buy TSLA sales, rather than building their own electic/zev cars -- and moving recent capex in to the next one.
This is all fine for some people, several investors are quite open about their buying into the dream and putting their money on Musk and don't actually care about the viability and scalability of the business model... Because Musk assures them next year they'll be building hundreds of thousands of cars.... Which is why they missed their delivery targets last time, they were too focused on building all these cars they didn't have time to ship them out, or something.
Depends who you ask, but some people are firmly of the belief that they've already sold 400,000 model 3's... because a lot of people have put down a refundable $1000 reservation on one.
There is a lot more to why Tesla as a business shouldn't be held in the high regard that it is by many and as i've said before... To me it appears Musk just wants to become a TBTF part of the energy infrastructure, so who cares about a solid business model then?
https://www.wsj.com/articles/elon-musk-sets-ambitious-goals-at-teslaand-often-falls-short-1471275436 [wsj.com]
But in the mean time he can dick about being the messiah of private space travel, hyperloop and artificial intelligence.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 03 2017, @11:04PM
Toyota Motor Manufacturing is one of 13 sister companies of Toyada (a holding company). It is the largest and best known. when you said "Toyota" you are saying "Toyota Motor Manufacturing". The sisters have many sub-relationships, like one is into Foods (like Orange Juice), Recycle Metals, and Diabetic Supplies, but also tires for VW and yes, Telsa.
It is normal, look at Alphabet and Google.
(Score: 3, Informative) by takyon on Friday February 03 2017, @07:53PM
Tesla and Panasonic are spending hundreds of millions or billions of dollars [arstechnica.com] on a solar panel factory in Buffalo, NY, so it's no wonder that The Buffalo News would give Musklord a pass.
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(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday February 03 2017, @10:00PM
Shhhh! Hush! I happen to own Tesla stock that I'd really like to see go even more off the charts. Also, if Elon manages to get our transportation infrastructure to pivot from oil to EVs, it would be a very large move toward energy independence, impoverishing oil sheiks who want to destroy us, and saving the environment all in one.
I mean, I get where you're coming from, but Elon is genuinely smart and a strategic thinker. I really hope he succeeds because his goals overlap with several of mine.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bob_super on Friday February 03 2017, @10:40PM
> impoverishing oil sheiks who want to destroy us
They just need enough unrest to keep the barrel price high.
Actually destroying us would really hurt both their income and their dollar-based savings...
(Score: 2) by n1 on Friday February 03 2017, @11:29PM
I agree, Musk wouldn't be where he is today without being smart and thinking strategically.
The broader aspects of the vision, are something I am hugely in support of... I would buy an EV today if it was viable for my use cases, but right now they're only viable for urban populations who are not hauling construction materials. Which is the opposite of what I need a vehicle for. My position is very much not against electric cars/ZEV, just the way Tesla as a business is being run and used. I DO NOT WANT ANOTHER ICE VEHICLE. But there is no other option on the horizon and certainly nothing coming from Musk.
Again, the vision is great in parts, although the reliance on relatively complex finance arrangements as an underpinning for their revenue is not something to entice me. I want to buy a product outright upfront, and expect it to last as long as the equivalent did in decades prior. Not in a 3-5 year product cycle. This problem persists with the current ICE vehicles too, they are not built to last hard use for more than 3-5 years.
As with all marketing, it's generally fairly pleasing to the ear... you're being sold on an idea/concept/dream, and that's great... But the reality is not quite the same as the vision, and those two are not going to be lining up any time soon.
I try to separate it in to 3 parts... Product, Vision, Business.... The product is perfect for some consumers, but there are many billions of us in the world that are not being pitched to... The vision is noble, but talk is cheap, financialization is the more tangible reality and is certainly not cheap... The business is a shit-show that no one can look at and seek to emulate or be inspired by in pursuit of the next phase of an 'energy revolution'... Unless you're inspired by someone with designs on a cult of personality being in the right place at the right time, with a few billion in their pocket from fintech and the right contacts in business and government.
Musk is disrupting, but in a way that's extremely palatable to Wall Street and existing business empires, except some of the 'big oil' participants ... but even then Telsa will have real competition by 2020 from the traditional manufacturers. It's going to be a slow migration and a long path to ZEV's being the big player in the market.
By all means, buy a Tesla and invest in the company if you believe in it all, there is potentially plenty of rewards and growth to be had in the short term. Personally, i'm waiting to see how the roll-out and scale-up of model 3 production goes before I take the company seriously, when it can start playing by the rules that everyone else has to... being evaluated on it's products and it's business financial performance, rather than just 'faith' in the dear leader. I call him Elon Hubbard.
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday February 04 2017, @01:41AM
I'd buy an EV if and only if they had a manual transmission version. Which won't happen because of the nature of electric motors.
Actually, maybe that would be a good idea - wouldn't that allow a car with an extended range of speeds compared to existing gas manuals? It would probably reach ridiculously unsafe speeds for the road, but maybe allow the possibility of more efficiency and longer travel distances per charge?
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Saturday February 04 2017, @02:41AM
I haven't driven a Tesla yet and don't know how you switch modes. The BMW i3 has a little joystick where the gear shift in a manual would be that does it. I suppose a person could switch modes that way while driving, if they were so inclined. I usually pick one mode and stick with it for the whole voyage.
I really like the linear acceleration, though. It's clean and smooth and gives me the sensation of the Enterprise jumping to warp. The lurches and lulls of automatic and manual ICEs are something i don't miss.
Washington DC delenda est.