#like its bad enough its a cybertruck then they had to go and make it even worse???

[asundine]

I just got jumpscared by a cybertruck that was so ugly I took a wrong turn and didn't realize for almost 2 blocks

[kleptomatic]

modern car design has honestly gone to shit

one reason is that it is now cheaper to put touchscreens, servos, and just screens in general than it is to actually engineer a properly working mechanical system, despite those being around for a literal century now

what's with the "one screen in the middle that controls everything" design philosophy anyways? "we want our drivers to look away from the road" is not. y'know. safe

the futuristic aspect also draws in buyers and (probably) investors, which makes it easier to fund projects. because futurism is better. these cars don't need to last!

and that's another problem: cars, ICE and EV, are not really built to last anymore. yes, all vehicles have a lifetime that they are rated for, but honestly it feels like it's getting shorter. or maybe consumerism has something to do with it: you always need to buy the newer and better car.

driving habits also do have something to do with it though, short commutes with lots of starting/stopping the engine do wear out parts faster. a lot of modern cars have the ability to turn off the engine while at a standstill, which does help increase fuel efficiency at the detriment of the engine

EVs do have drops in battery performance/capacity over time, which doesn't help

shifters are also changing. a lot. i mean, some are definitely cool, and I don't mind things like the BMW shifters that are just an automatic but fancy looking:

but then you have uh. well. tesla. with the touchscreen shifter. ok then

also they have the backup shift buttons. on the ceiling. yeah.

and their turn signals suck. that's enough dunking on tesla for this post. but do continue to dunk on tesla. especially the 6000+ lb. deathtrap called the cybertruck

which actually leads into the next point, big dumb trucks (and the general size increase of cars/the move towards SUVs and crossovers, but mainly the trucks). you know what they are. the giant trucks that have hoods taller than most sedans. that had that beautiful graphic of having worse sight lines than a main battle tank

safe for everyone, you see? they exist because of EPA regulations, after a certain size you're a work truck and less subject to regulations. and also the regulations on small vehicles are much higher than larger ones, in terms of like power to weight. so its a lot easier to make big than make small

most of them are pavement princesses anyways

repeal the chicken tax though, bring in light truck competition from overseas manufacturers. i want my kei trucks/cars (although that's the 25 year import law)

SUVs are painted as being safer, but actually have a higher center of gravity and are more prone to rolling over. they are safer though, cause they have more mass, which means what you hit gets damaged more and you get damaged less.

crossovers are weird cause they kind of can skirt regulations? not sure how they work

you can bypass some regulations with the "SUV overbite." give yourself a good approach angle, and now you're not a passenger vehicles and aren't subject to as many regulations. consequence is you look like this (sorry lexus)

electronic handbrakes. what. it makes sense, somewhat, but also manual handbrakes work perfectly well and are far less prone to failure (also drifting but)

push to start. i mean, it's not all bad, but keys are fun. give me keys. manual is better (although not necessarily for transmissions). don't be constantly emitting a signal that can be copied to steal a car. tesla i'm looking at you. a lot in this

i will say that not all digital displays are created equal. as far as i'm concerned, toyota/lexus have some very beautiful gauge clusters:

spicy, sleek, dare i say sexy, and they trickled down from the lexus LFA, which had a 9k rpm redline and got to that so fast they had to make a new digital cluster just to keep up. wild stuff. plus it's not too in your face and still has some mechanical components. nice

honestly no idea where i was going with this, but:

modern car design is getting worse because of futurism, trying to keep costs down, and poorly written/considered regulations

Touchscreens do not belong in cars

[influencermagazineuk]

Tesla's Big Comeback: Stock Soars 27% in a Week

Tesla's stock surged by 27% this past week, wiping out all its losses for the year, following some bad performance at the beginning of the year. The surge was way beyond the anticipated Q2 vehicle delivery figures. Despite the demanding situations for Tesla, its perception remains great towards the future with new projects in line, just like the Robotaxi. Tesla started rough in 2024, but this week things came full circle. Tesla's stock had surged 27 per cent at the end of the week scraping off its losses for the year. The stock closed the week at $251.55 above where it was at the end of the previous year at $248.40. Earlier this year in April, Tesla's stock had fallen to $138.80.This surprise upward pushes occurred due to Tesla's car delivery record on Tuesday. The document showed that even though deliveries had been 4.8% much fewer as compared to the previous year, it became a smaller drop than inside the first quarter. This gave buyers desire for the rest of the year. Tesla had confronted many problems in advance inside the 12 months. In the primary zone, income in their cars decreased, they needed to lay off many employees, and there had been gossips that they canceled plans to make a less expensive family automobile in Texas. However, now Tesla looks forward to higher days forward. They will declare their 2nd-quarter monetary results on July 23. People are mainly attracted to how great a deal of cash they made by selling vehicles. Since last year's beginning, Tesla has used heavy discounts and offers to lure humans into buying electric cars. This also applies to the popular models of a Model three sedans and Model Y crossovers, droit up to the high-priced Model S and Model X. In late 2023, Tesla just started selling a new Cybertruck. In a post by a social media platform, the Cybertruck will finish the second quarter of 2024 as the United States' top-selling fully electric pickup truck. Through the same period, Ford moved 7,902 of their electrified F-150 Lightning pickups.In addition to the economic report announced for next month, Cantor Fitzgerald analysts believe a big ad event will be the case for Tesla stock—something called Robotaxi Day. On 8th August, Tesla plans to give a view of its new Robotaxi, otherwise named a Cybercab. Though the car will not go on sale until 2027, it shall form a very critical part of Tesla's future.Despite the current profits, Tesla stays at the back of the general marketplace this year. The Nasdaq index is up 22 per cent and the S&P 500 has risen 17 per cent, while Tesla's inventory has simplest long gone up by the use of 1.2 per cent.Partly due to controversial comments by CEO Elon Musk and his political involvement, Tesla has taken a hit in terms of brand image, says the Axios Harris poll released recently. In yet another survey by the New York Times, it is found that some people are such a turn-off to his behaviour that they are choosing not to buy Tesla cars. It is also missing the target on its promise to make its motors completely self-driving. Musk informed investors in 2016 that all new Tesla’s have the hardware necessary for driving themselves. But last month, he declared that the whole new hardware setup remains required to do so, stating these features will only be fully activated once the software is thorough enough allowing them to do so.In brief, Tesla simply had the best week with its stock price increasing by a thoughtful mile. Though extra hurdles and postponements are yet to be overcome, the business enterprise looks forward to fresh challenges and enhancements that may support the company develop way more within the future. Read the full article

[thesevillereport]

In Focus: Lordstown Motors, We Wanted It So Bad

In 2003, when the average price of gas was $1.59 per gallon, two guys, Marc and Martin started an electric car company. The following year Marc and Martin connected with an investor named Elon. Two other members, Ian and J.B. would join and make up the founding team of the new electric car company.

Fast forward five years and Elon, the investor, is in full control, and the original two founders Marc and Martin have left the company. The company eventually goes on to become the biggest thing in electric vehicles and the company we all know and love today, Tesla.

Many people aren't aware that Tesla lost its original founders in 2008. Elon Musk has become Tesla, and so today people associate everything Tesla to Elon Musk. But Tesla had its moment where its founders stepped away, and left the investor in charge. Which causes me to wonder, could Lordstown Motors (RIDE) follow in Tesla's footsteps and make what seems like a rough time for the company just a speed bump in its overall history?

Last week Lordstown's CEO Steve Burns and CFO Julio Rodriquez stepped down from the company. The news was the cherry on top of a bad 2021 for Lordstown.

In March Hindenburg Research released a report claiming that Lordstown had misled investors on their production capabilities and the demand for the company's electric truck. According to the Hindenburg report, former employees claim that a Lordstown electric vehicle is several years away from happening. In addition Hindenburg pointed out that the purchase commitments that Lordstown had touted for their Endurance truck were not firm commitments.

After spending months denying the Hindenburg Research report, Lordstown announced in early June that the company has limited capital which would force them to produce half the vehicles originally forecasted by the company . Now add to that the CEO and CFO resigning, and as you can see, it has not been a very good 2021 for Lordstown.

What's Next?

The latest news from Lordstown is that the company has enough cash to last until next May and that production of the Endurance electric truck will start this September. It's decent news to investors, but nothing to write home about after now knowing that those pre-orders that were once celebrated by the company weren't firm commitments to buy. Assuming thatthe Endurance does go into production in September and it turns out to be everything that Lordstown says it will be, it will still take some time after production for the word to spread, which means the company still needs more cash.

Industry analyst Joseph Spak of RBC Capital Markets believes Lordstown needs $2.25 billion between this year and 2025 to remain solvent. Spak presumes the company will get the cash it needs through either government funding or by issuing additional equity. Both options at this point should be in the electric vehicle startup playbook.

Tesla sold new shares to the market twice in 2020. 17 years after the company started, and with thousands of cars produced and on the road it still raised money through issuing additional equity. Andlet's not forget the $465 million loaned to Tesla by the Obama administration back in 2009. The amount pales in comparison to the $50 billion the government loaned GM, but at the time Tesla had sold less than 1,000 vehicles. The loan would be a big catalyst for Tesla's future success.

For Lordstown the only way out of the mess is goingthrough the mess, and the person tasked with leading them temporarily out of the mess is Angela Strand. Strand's resume regarding all things electricis impressive. She co-founded Chanje, a joint venture between Smith Electric Vehicles and FDG Electric Vehicles Ltd, she founded another electric based company In-Charge. She also served as Vice President at Workhorse for a time.  

By Strand's side on the management team there's Lordstown's president Rich Schmidt, who previously served as Tesla's Director of Manufacturing Operations between 2012 and 2017, so he's seen some tough times in the electric vehicle business. There's also John Vo, Lordstown's Vice President of Propulsion. Vo served as the Head of Global Manufacturing for Tesla from 2011 to 2017, he's another Lordstown exec who's seen tough times in the EV industry. Finally, Darren Post Lordstown's V.P of Engineering led five new vehicle programs from concept to production while at GM.

The management appears to be familiar with setbacks as well as success, so this current issue shouldn't have anyone on the management team very rattled.  The question that investors have to ask themselves though is can this management team execute if they're able to raise the funds they need?

We Wanted It So Bad

Since hearing its former CEO speak about how EV companies prior to Lordstown were only going after the weekend warrior truck owner and not the everyday workman and woman, I was hooked on Lordstown's vision. After seeing the Cybertruck and Nikola's Badger my question was how do the people I know use those trucks to work in? The contractors, the pool service people, and lawn care people, the diving instructors I know need a truck that's functional, not one that just turns heads, and that's what Lordstown promised, a functional electric work truck.

However, what I and many investors who were caught up in Steve Burns' dream forgot was that starting an automobile company is extremely hard. Elon Musk once wrote there are onlytwo American automakers that haven't gone bankrupt, that's Ford (F) and Tesla. It's an extremely difficult business to maneuver, and yet when investors saw an EV company making themselves public we all bought in hoping that it would be the next Tesla.

Tesla's stock price run from $42.12 per share (adjusted for the five-for-one stock split)  in 2019 to over $300 per share in August 2020 when it announced its five-for-one stock split hypnotized us all. All of us who missed out on owning Tesla for less than $20 a share in 2011 were hoping Lordstown could be our cheap buy-in to the growing electric vehicle market. We wanted and expected all of the good of Tesla, but never once stopped to consider the bad that Tesla had to endure to get to where they are today.

Following Tesla since 2010, I've seen how close it's come to not making it, and because it did make it I assumed that the path it laid out would be what future EV companies would follow to make the travel from startup to established auto maker less strenuous. But Lordstown wasn't looking to walk in Tesla's shadow, it was looking to create and sell its own technology to a commercial market, and in doing so it was starting from zero and carving out its own path.

I don't know if I'm still in love with Steve Burns' vision or I'm just a hopeless optimist, but I'm still a believer. Right now Lordstown's management nor its investors can think about winning the game, the focus now should be on staying in the game.

I can't think of any manufacturing company that hasn't gone through a financial crisis at some point in their start. I expect all of the startup electric vehicle companies to go through it at some point or another, minus Rivian, who seems to just keep raising money. In 2019 Rivian raised over $2 billion and in 2020 raised another $2.5 billion. According to Business Insider Lordstown received $675 million upon going public by way of a SPAC acquisition.

Also, as amazing as Ford's electric F150 looks, I'm still not convinced that Ford is all in on electric vehicles, and because of this I think the electric commercial truck / fleet truck market is still up for grabs.

Investing in Lordstown is a big leap of faith. Based on all that has been revealed, I think the company should trade at a lower valuation than it currently trades at right now ($1.88 billion). However, with the right CEO and funding this company could be the next big thing in electric vehicles, and then we'll be paying a lot more than $1.88 billion for the company.

My thoughts still go back to the commercial vehicle / fleet vehicle market. Precedence Research valued the commercial vehicle market at $1.51 trillion in 2019, and it expects the market to grow to $2.55 trillion by 2027. I pass so many fleet vehicles on my daily runs, and I know that one day those trucks are going to be electric, and I wonder who will those electric trucks be made by? The market offers a lot of room for a quality electric truck company to grow, but first, Lordstown has to stay in the game.