The inspiration behind Tony Stark’s Iron Man business man persona, Elon Musk, is truly a fascinating and intriguing character. I will confess that my first impression of Musk, was an eccentric rich play boy, who craved the lime light with no real substance – the technologies Paris Hilton.
I couldn’t have been more wrong in my initial view of Musk. The man, immigrated from South Africa, cut his teeth in the early 90’s technology boom, first creating and selling Zip2 then more successfully, founding and selling PayPal. The theme so far, Musk was a disruptive business man, challenging the conventional wisdoms within a particular industry sector.
He wasn’t finished yet. The car industry, the space race and the worlds energy producers are all in his cross hairs and he’s making significant progress with each.
This book tracks the history of his motor company, Tesla Motors Inc., a company that has redefined the auto-mobile in the modern day age. The media can’t heap enough praise on the infamous, “insane” Model S. What made a company that just barely celebrated its 10th year, leap frog and leave every established manufacturer with their pants down?
The book retraces the steps, from the humble beginnings of attempting to create an electric car with the sexiness and practicality of a high end luxury car, shaking the classic “golf cart” view of an EV car.
You are taken through the various milestones of what it takes to create a modern day mass scale automotive company. Musk has a 3 step program that is so far on course. First create a limited run (expensive) car, to prove the market, shake out the initial findings and create a media buzz. The Roadster (loosely based on the British Lotus Elise) was that first car that had a 2500 production run. The next is to create a high end sedan, to compete with the likes of Mercedes, BMW and Lexus, and to use that to show case just precisely what an EV can do while catering to a practical and demanding audience. This car is to bring the company to profitability and maintain a positive cash flow. The Model S (originally named WhiteStar) more than ticked that box. Finally, to create a mass appeal car, in the $30k price bracket, that can be bought by the average motorist; the Model X coming later (hopefully) in 2015.
Musk involved himself at every stage, micro managing some of the design elements, including the infamous reclining door handles. He wanted a car that not only redefined the auto-mobile for the 21st century but had the performance of a super car, such as a McClaren F1 or Ferrari. His cautionary tale to his team was to say: “DeLorean looked great, but had shitty performance”.
Tesla while an American built car, is more international than probably most realize. The Roadster had a lot of help from Lotus (British). Daimler (German) and Toyota (Japanese) are major investors and customers of Tesla, while Panasonic (Japanese) supply the batteries and a partner in the GigaFactory project.
But the story is far more interesting and intricate than quick sound bites. Musk’s legendary energy (he apparently works 100hrs a week; saying he can do in 4 months what most people can only achieve in a year) affords him the ability to be active in not just one disruptive high tech company, but three; Tesla, SpaceX and SolarCity.
This book is well written and very pacy in its narrative. I completed the book in just two sittings as each page I turned, I was marvelling at the complexity of what it takes to bring around a revolution. What Amazon done for shopping, Tesla is redefining what it means to design, build and deliver the next generation of automotive transportation. But to limit Tesla to just cars is doing them a huge injustice; they are an energy company with many of their innovations in the world of battery power management.
Musk believes in the greater good, proving this, by open sourcing (a common term in the software industry from which he came) all of Tesla’s patents, for any company to come along and kick start their EV program. Inspiring.
I came to this book to learn more. I am the recent owner of a Tesla Model S car, and it literally takes my breath away each mile I drive. When you drive the Model S you know you are sitting in a time machine, 20 years in the future. Never did I think I would be driving a car daily, that can do 0-30 in 0.7 seconds, beating nearly every super car on the planet, with no production car getting anywhere near that.
I had to know more on the story of this revolution and this book filled in a lot of the gaps. I am far more appreciative of the sweat and effort it took to bring this car to the market. I feel I am no longer driving an EV car, but taking part in a crucial part of history that will change how we view and interact with what we know today as the humble car.
The story is still unfolding. The book goes up to the summer of 2014. That is nearly a year ago now, which in Tesla years, is a lifetime away. Much has delivered a lot since then, and Musk shows no sign of slowing down.
Looking forward to reading the follow up to this story.
alan williamson 