TE
TechEcho
Home24h TopNewestBestAskShowJobs
GitHubTwitter
Home

TechEcho

A tech news platform built with Next.js, providing global tech news and discussions.

GitHubTwitter

Home

HomeNewestBestAskShowJobs

Resources

HackerNews APIOriginal HackerNewsNext.js

© 2025 TechEcho. All rights reserved.

Apple will buy Tesla for $75b in 18 months

43 pointsby hodgesmrover 10 years ago

20 comments

stephanfroedeover 10 years ago
There are some misconceptions in the article (imo):<p>The claim that game is already over is wrong, major car manufacturers like BMW, Audi, Mercedes, GM, Ford, PSA, are working on all possible approaches at once. They tested and tried any possible power train technology you can think of (except fission reactors and fusion reactors).<p>They are offering integrated services, even if they are moving slower than SV inspired companies, u should not underestimated their ability to move faster than expected. The automotive market is extremely competitive, companies that are succesful their, are succesful for a reason.<p>Cars are extremly complex, far more complex than an iPhone (there is a reason why they cost much more than an iPhone).<p>Teslas advantage is mainly that it can make money with selling certificates in California. This is good, but can not be applied worldwide.<p>The automotive industries supply chain is vast, they do operate globally, their relationships are much more complex than the electronics industry.<p>The devil is in the detail, Teslas much admired agility is no match for a Porsche or an i8. Building engines is an art.<p>Sales channels, selling a car is an art in itself (I do know something about selling cars, because my business idea is about selling cars, better of course than anyone else;-)). The sales channels are established and deep in the markets. Tesla has some trouble in China.<p>After Sales, a car needs after sales support.<p>Regulation, global car regulation is complex, wild and full of wonders.<p>Tastes, u will not believe how different tastes are globally. A Tesla looks like a Japanese Car to me as a German (which is a malus). A BMW, or Audi has it&#x27;s own design language which is full of character and sophistication.<p>The hill to sell a car here is really really big.<p>But if Tesla and Apple bring some new ideas on the table, it would probably good for all participants.<p>@asknbid or @obylocom
评论 #9053192 未加载
评论 #9053692 未加载
shmerlover 10 years ago
I hope not! We don&#x27;t want crazy patent wars spilling in there too. So far Tesla were quite positive in avoiding that:<p><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/06/12/elon-musk-take-our-tesla-patents-please/" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.washingtonpost.com&#x2F;blogs&#x2F;the-switch&#x2F;wp&#x2F;2014&#x2F;06&#x2F;12...</a><p>If Apple buys them you can bet their crazy obsession with patents will poison Tesla as well.
Shivetyaover 10 years ago
If anyone buys Tesla it likely would be an established car company because Apple buying Tesla would not solve Tesla&#x27;s second problem.<p>Their first problem is money. They don&#x27;t have the money to ramp up their car building ability to support the III. They have delivery and market issues with just the S<p>Their second problem is, they don&#x27;t have the supplier network large enough to support the III nor the expertise to get it out on time. Apple buying them won&#x27;t fix that.<p>Apple&#x27;s problem is that they are sitting on too much cash to make a good decision. There really isn&#x27;t anyone worth buying, Tesla surely isn&#x27;t.<p>I would have thought Apple would be better served by making self driving cars simple through software and hardware that goes into other manufacturers cars.
评论 #9053438 未加载
51Cardsover 10 years ago
&quot;Apple’s design team, software, and global distribution would actually LEVEL Tesla up.&quot;<p>&quot;Software&quot;... lately? No. Sorry. Don&#x27;t agree on design either.<p>Thing is I&#x27;m not sure Elon wants to let go of Tesla. Tesla is on a roll right now and Elon strikes me as the kind of individual who would personally see that out, at least for the foreseeable future. He has visions of changing the world (and access to other worlds). He may take investments, but I don&#x27;t think he&#x27;s ready to see it sold outright.
nlhover 10 years ago
While it&#x27;s a fun idea, I&#x27;m skeptical (though it would be cool!)<p>I think it&#x27;s far more likely that Apple ends up either <i>designing</i> a car for Tesla or, less-spectacularly, &quot;powering&quot; a car (which basically means expanding CarPlay to a bigger role than v1 will have on the dashboard.)<p>I still think it&#x27;s ridiculous that car manufacturers essentially create their own OSs (yes, I know they get them from 3rd parties and some are QNX-powered, etc.) but in essence, every car has its own UI&#x2F;UX, most of which are terrible.<p>CarPlay is step 1. I think the evolution of that is a car that&#x27;s run entirely on OSX&#x2F;iOS&#x2F;CarOS -- with a real UI, good UX, and the joy of well-designed electronics. Modern-day cars are vastly more computer-controlled than they used to be, and it makes sense that Apple wants to be a part of that action.<p>I don&#x27;t think we&#x27;re going to see Apple The Car Manufacturer, but I do think we&#x27;re going to see &quot;Powered by Apple&quot; soon.
评论 #9053447 未加载
ChuckMcMover 10 years ago
This has got to be the next &#x27;Googlezon&#x27; (EPIC 2014), I&#x27;ve now seen 3 people suggest that Apple and Tesla merge&#x2F;acquire (one of them had Tesla acquiring Apple)<p>I think Tesla is in for a world of hurt actually. Pretty much everyone &quot;gets it&quot; now, and there is at least 10x the capital engaged in creating Tesla competitive cars as there is at Tesla creating their own cars. That means 10x more success paths explored per unit time. That means 10x more noise in the market to obscure Tesla&#x27;s message. That means 1&#x2F;10th the &quot;oxygen&quot; left for anything else. The best thing Elon did was the &quot;gigafactory&quot; as it will have a lock on battery supply if none of these new battery technologies come to market. That provides a pretty good defense against the onslaught. But every car company is gunning for him. It&#x27;s pretty impressive.
评论 #9054718 未加载
ghaffover 10 years ago
The main reason why it doesn&#x27;t seem totally crazy is that Apple just has so much money and has been so successful in their current markets is that they&#x27;re arguably going to have to do something radical at some point if they&#x27;re going to continue to grow. It&#x27;s unclear to me that an Apple Watch or TV-related tech of some sort is radical enough or big enough.<p>That said:<p>- Everything stephanfroede wrote about the challenges of the automobile market and the level of competition there.<p>- Modular auto displays&#x2F;electronics are definitely somewhere Apple could play. But partnering is arguably the more profitable approach there. Look at Bose for example.<p>- The article makes the argument for totally self-driving cars arriving within just a few years. I don&#x27;t see it. (Although the case does apply to some degree even if you have autonomous navigation on some freeways within an interesting time horizon.)
martin_bechover 10 years ago
Apple buying tesla, makes increasingly more sense, if Apple really wants to get into cars. Electric cars is a whole different ballgame, and Tesla has shown that its possible to get apple like margins... Getting my popcorn ready and getting back into the Tesla stock..
评论 #9053196 未加载
higherpurposeover 10 years ago
&gt; Elon Musk as the CEO of Apple? Wow. Doubt he would want to do it, but I could see him being the Chairman — and that would be kind of special.<p>That&#x27;s the ONLY reason why I would want Apple to buy Tesla - if Elon Musk can become its CEO let&#x27;s say in 5-7 years. I can&#x27;t even imagine what Elon Musk could do with Apple&#x27;s money, but I&#x27;m pretty sure he&#x27;d at the very least take on fusion research, and other stuff that would accelerate the arrival of a new &quot;space age&quot;.<p>Otherwise, Apple buying Tesla just as another profit-center and to make fanbois happy that they only have to buy their products religiously from a single company? Screw that.<p>Put Elon Musk on the schedule to become CEO and then we&#x27;re talking.
BillFranklinover 10 years ago
This post could do with the title being prepended with &#x27;I think...&#x27;
simonebrunozziover 10 years ago
Apple will NOT buy Tesla for $75B in 18 months - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9055177" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=9055177</a>
desdivover 10 years ago
Tesla&#x27;s current market cap is $25b. Isn&#x27;t $75b too much of a price premium?<p>To be fair though, Tesla&#x27;s share price went up by 100% over the past 18 months, so a 200% increase over the <i>next</i> 18 month isn&#x27;t unimaginable.<p>[0] <a href="http://www.google.ca/finance?cid=12607212" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.google.ca&#x2F;finance?cid=12607212</a>
asadlionpkover 10 years ago
I don&#x27;t think Elon would want to sell Tesla since he can benefit in longterm as a supplier for batteries&#x2F;EV tech?
mfisher87over 10 years ago
&gt;Google is another likely buyer, but Google can’t compete with Apple’s war chest?<p>I always thought Google had more cash than Apple...this sounded off, so looked it up. Google&#x27;s at 64B cash + liquid assets, Apple at 32B. Oh, no, how will Google ever compete with that?
评论 #9053223 未加载
评论 #9053208 未加载
评论 #9053201 未加载
评论 #9053212 未加载
评论 #9053216 未加载
评论 #9068868 未加载
评论 #9053205 未加载
intopiecesover 10 years ago
Lots of the things on this list could be accomplished with a partnership rather than an acquisition. Can anyone elaborate as to why Apple might choose to acquire over simply buying in?
评论 #9053104 未加载
coding4allover 10 years ago
For all that is great in the world, I hope this isn&#x27;t true.
frade33over 10 years ago
Cars used to be mechanical miracle, today they are controlled by &#x27;computers&#x27; and &#x27;softwares&#x27;. Above all, their pricing is rip-off for high end cars esp., I am not currently sold for electric-only car, but I am more favorable for hybrid and I hope Apple make one too.<p>If you can read, computers and software above while you do know skills of Apple for both industrial and software design, perhaps you could find the missing piece of the puzzle.<p>If they re not working on a car, they should. And we do know, Apple can bring down the price of &#x27;high-end&#x27; to near affordable. That&#x27;s where, the current leaders in this industry need to worry.
评论 #9053426 未加载
mk00over 10 years ago
no, they wont.
mbleighover 10 years ago
Tesla and Apple are ideological opposites, I really hope this never comes to pass.
xtrumanxover 10 years ago
The authoritative sound of the title bothers me like click-bait titles.
评论 #9053455 未加载