VW was late, Toyota will be too late ?

[sujeeva]

Marketing matters, but its interesting to note whilst Tesla bags 1000 s of pre orders, a 100 year old Porsche had to use traditional customer experience model to sell its Taycan.
Porsche created an EV charging truck that can recharge 10 Porsche Taycan's at once. They currently has seven of these chargers on wheels that have been used at various "customer driving experiences" and events.
In the contrary Tesla showrooms are virtual, 82% of its Model 3 customers bought with no test drive and 78% of the sales were online. 

Seems the worlds No 1 automaker is falling short in innovation. 
Toyota's fate will be no different, being so late to hit the new energy and new mobility market. They are cash rich, but Kodak and Nokia was the same at one point!

Problems are not only with marketing.

[Crosswind]

So what are u trying to say exactly? 

[ajm]

Tesla is a one man show like Apple, VW Porsche Toyota are traditional industries. But it's good to see Tesla breaking the stereotypes and challenging the long established design and manufacturing processes. Because in the current age, less is more!

[iRage]

Uhhh...I don't know why you are sighting just VW and Toyota...the same applies to all manufacturers....

Everyone knows Toyota is late in to the EV game...in fact so are all the Japanese manufacturers except for Nissan and Mitsubishi in some convoluted way. For the most part all the Japanese manufacturers were working on EVs a long long time ago...Mitsubishi as early as the 1970s and Toyota had a commercial ready EV RAV4 in the 90s (which got clamped down by big O)...for some reason most of them went the fuel cell route...and now are partnering up with a lot of Chinese companies for a boost in EV tech. Now they are extending that solution to community based mobility solutions (last Tokyo Motorshow Toyota had 3 actual concept cars on display...that was it...everything else was a bunch of robots and hospital on wheels, etc...) and seem to be believing that cars are going to be a niche market.

As for Tesla...well...Musk is showman....kind of like Jobs. He makes a splash with all his presentations...over promising without promising and under delivering without actually making it obvious. There are a lot of smart people working behind him but what sells everything at the end is Musk's showmanship and taking the approach to being a tech shop rather than an auto production shop (they R&D more in to tech like AI, batteries, etc...than in to the actual car component of the car itself (which is pretty much borrowed from the others and modified for the most part). Obviously the traditional car manufacturers cannot easily pivot due to their pre-establishment.

[kmeeg]

I wonder big companies not into EVs because they can't or they're not interested yet. I think if big companies want to they will do it like General Motors coming up with promising products like Hummer EV. I don't want to spoil the fun. Check out the explanation from Engineering Explained.

I think big companies like VW, Nissan, Mazda, Toyota,  Honda are not stupid as you think. They have enough money for R&D to cater the demand. (Just my opinion and could be wrong).

[MaleCortana]

I think Tesla is a bit of a outlier in this business because it sells in a quite similar manner to an iPhone. Heck I wouldn't be surprised if people wouldn't camp outside dealerships to buy the 'latest Tesla' overnight if that was possible. They also have a similar approach to fixing your item (Your car can't be fixed by yourself or your mechanic, need to go to a Tesla Authorized place) because you don't 'own' your item (There's a lobbying group against Tesla and Apple, more on Right to Repair). And most EV enthusiasts are Tech Enthusiasts and not Car Enthusiasts (Although there can always be an overlap)

 

And to say legacy manufacturers will be left in the dust is difficult to say, Toyota Corolla still is the best selling car in the world and is growing and the since the companies are massive they can buy their way into any IP they want. (Ford buying Rivian F150E? E150? it'll be cool anyway). Regardless the top 10 cars sold in the world are not EV so there's no point in investing heavy right now for them.

In the next five years EV won't be the name of the game, Hummer just launched its EV Truck with a 1000 horsepower and Honda is coming out with E. They're still testing the water but when push comes to shove they'll definitely be able to pivot (They're a bit smarter than we give them credit for)

 

 

Edited October 22, 2020 by MaleCortana

[kmeeg]

1 hour ago, MaleCortana said:

 (Your car can't be fixed by yourself or your mechanic, need to go to a Tesla Authorized place) because you don't 'own' your item (There's a lobbying group against Tesla and Apple, more on Right to Repair). And most EV enthusiasts are Tech Enthusiasts and not Car Enthusiasts (Although there can always be an overlap)

 

 

Another I problem I see is when they are need to be fixed they take a long time as Tesla is a small company and not able to build parts faster. I've know cases near where I live a tiny fender bender take 3 months to fix at Tesla certified facility since you can't take it to a regular body shop. In US insurance will give a loaner car only about a month and you will be out of a vehicle when Tesla is in a shop for fixing.

[AVANTE]

22 hours ago, sujeeva said:

Marketing matters, but its interesting to note whilst Tesla bags 1000 s of pre orders, a 100 year old Porsche had to use traditional customer experience model to sell its Taycan.
Porsche created an EV charging truck that can recharge 10 Porsche Taycan's at once. They currently has seven of these chargers on wheels that have been used at various "customer driving experiences" and events.
In the contrary Tesla showrooms are virtual, 82% of its Model 3 customers bought with no test drive and 78% of the sales were online. 

Seems the worlds No 1 automaker is falling short in innovation. 
Toyota's fate will be no different, being so late to hit the new energy and new mobility market. They are cash rich, but Kodak and Nokia was the same at one point!

Problems are not only with marketing.

I've got nothing to add in terms of fuel for discussion. 

But ironically, did you know that the first Porsche was infact, an electric car? Made in 1898, by Ferdinand Porsche himself, named the Porsche P1. It used a 3hp electric motor, had a range of 79km and a top speed of 35kmh 

 

Edited October 22, 2020 by AVANTE

[ajm]

In Europe the biggest hurdles to EV/ fuel cell technology acceptance are Range, Cost and charging/H2 infrastructure. 

For example EV batteries are seperately leased and it becomes quite expensive if you drive more than 20000km/year. 

Market penetration and  charging/ H2 infrastructure have become a chicken-egg problem.

Edited October 22, 2020 by ajm