Did Tesla Take A Page From Hyundai's Book?

by Derek Kreindler

May 7th, 2013 12:12 PM

did tesla take a page from hyundai s book

As enthusiastic as I am about the actual product (when everyone was ready to crap all over Tesla based on some bad information, TTAC was one of the few publications to go to bat for the upstart auto maker), Elon Musk’s series of announcements, frequently couched in hyperbolic descriptions of their significance, are beginning to grate on me. Every week, Musk seems to descend from Mount Sinai bearing yet another set of tablets that promise to “disrupt” (to use a favorite term of Silicon Valley) the automotive landscape forever, yet end up being little more than a not-quite-a-lease program or some announcement about after-sales care.

A look through TTAC’s archives shows that Tesla has in fact cribbed some of their ideas from Hyundai. While Musk has endlessly touted that his pseudo-lease program will guarantee the value of the Model S, Hyundai has been making that same promise since April of 2011.

Meanwhile, Tesla’s service program, which Musk touts as the “world’s best” seems to have a lot in common with the one created by Hyundai for the Equu s. Both involve having your car picked up from the location of your choice and exchanged with a loaner vehicle, ensuring that you never have to step foot in a smelly service department ever again.

Perhaps we’ll soon find out that Tesla overstated their mileage claims for the Model S, which would then allow us to really draw some parallels between the two companies.

#ElonMusk #Hyundai #Tesla #TeslaModelS

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10 of 31 comments

Lunosalpha on May 07, 2013

Wait, what was the point of this post? Did I come to TTAC or Yahoo?

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Shaker on May 08, 2013

I think this is the "Tesla Will Fail" prognostication thread. Maybe so, but I'd say Musk and his workers came the closest yet to a "desirable" EV, despite the limitations of the technology - viewed that way, The Model S is a success. Personally, I'd love to go crazy and spend my 401(k) money on one, and drive the coolest car ever, but this "reality" thing keeps stopping me :-)

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Shaker on May 09, 2013

Consumer Reports just finished testing the Model S, and gave it a 99 out of 100, which (I'm reasonably sure) is their highest score ever. The demerits listed that kept it from a perfect score: "Limited range, long charging times, access, visibility, some controls." The pluses: "Energy efficiency, acceleration, quietness, ride, handling, braking, easy-to-use touch screen, luggage capacity, fit and finish." They averaged around 200 miles of range (180 cold weather, 220 warm), but needed 12 hours for a full charge on the standard 240 volt charger. Definitely not for everybody, but a brilliant second effort (my words). Edit: CR's calculated running costs (@ $0.11 kWHr) were $1.20/gal equivalent.

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- Danio3834 on May 09, 2013
  
  99 out of 100 for a nice car, but one that still has some very clear drawbacks? They should have just scored it "OVER 9000" with no explanation and been done with it.
  
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- Truckducken on May 09, 2013
  
  As someone who stopped reading CR's biased crap decades ago, I've gotta ask after seeing this preposterous figure: what score did they give the Volt? Being a product of the hated Detroit makers, I'm guessing it was slagged for long recharging times (even though there's a gas option) and using premium fuel, with a rating well south of the Prius, let alone the almighty Muskmobile. Let me speculate that if GM started selling a version of the Model S with nothing changed but the badges, it probably wouldn't crack 50 on the CR scale.
  
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Thelaine on May 09, 2013

I agree with gslip and shaker that this is an amazing car and that Musk is a brilliant man, but I do believe this product has a tiny market that will soon be tapped out and that this company will inevitably go tits up. Which reminds me, have you seen Elon's wife? Not bad for a nerd, Elon. Don't lose all your money.

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- EchoChamberJDM on May 09, 2013
  
  His first wife took him to the cleaners. Wonder how much of the paypal fotune she got? She was a hottie as well. He is better off being single. But like any nerd made good, he wants to be the envy of all the other nerds out there and will keep making more outlandish statements until he implodes. Just like the guy that ran Fisker, Victor Mueller from Saab, and Jim Press at Chrysler who insisted that they would never file bankruptcy. Lets not even talk about Enron, I will just stick with the automobile industry. Remember, its the CEOs job to be the chief salesman for the company, reality be dammed.
  
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- Corntrollio on May 09, 2013
  
  @EchoChamberJDM He's a psycho and a douche if you believe the account by his first wife. She knew him well before he made any money. She also didn't take him to the cleaners at all -- I'm not sure where you're getting that from. She got a healthy sum of about $10M in support payments plus the house from accounts I've read, and I believe they split custody of the 5 kids. Her post-nup didn't give her that much of the PayPal fortune, and she lost her bid to nullify it. If there had been no post-nup, she would have gotten half of the PayPal fortune under California law. The second wife got $4.2M over 9 years. I believe that was all from the pre-nup.
  
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- EchoChamberJDM on May 09, 2013
  
  @corntrollio Controllio - thanks for the info...not sure which wife it was, but I remember him living on a couch with friends back in 2007 or 2008 after his divorce and it was quite the story in the blog-o-sphere. My hunch is that he was hiding $$ from the IRS and didn't want to give anyone (let alone his ex wife) an idea of what he was woth. Now you have the opposite story - the press keep saying the man is worth billions. Perhaps now with his options on TSLA, which will soon be worthless. Today was jump the shark day for Tesla.
  
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- Corntrollio on May 10, 2013
  
  @EchoChamberJDM "but I remember him living on a couch with friends back in 2007 or 2008 after his divorce and it was quite the story in the blog-o-sphere." Those blog stories were BS. He wrote a response to that effect at some point. Someone started a rumor that he was poor, but come on -- think about how much money the guy had. Even in the worst divorce, the wife couldn't get more than her share of the community property under California law. That's how it works. He may have been living on people's couches for emotional support or something, but I doubt. He moved on to the second wife pretty seamlessly.
  
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