The Green Hunt

The green hunt has begun, innovative engineers and businessmen a like have embarked on their quest for clean energy and clean transportation. The spear head behind this push for innovative technologies is Tesla Motors. The company was first developed in 2003 by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning and further developed in 2004 by Elon Musk's where he led a round of investments and took over as chairman of Tesla Motors. Elon Musk was not only an innovationist in the world of green cars but also in the fields of green energy through SolarCity and space travel through his company SpaceX. With the guidance of Elon, Tesla Motors has come out successful, through the modern day automotive depression and furthermore has pushed the large “big 3” manufacturers that they were forced to follow Tesla’s trends of clean “fossil fuel independent” transportation.

The Road for Tesla began rough, they were in a time that is described as a SUV eccentric society and the world of green cars was a simple myth. Their goal was to take the idea of the electric car and transform it into a reality; “this is no longer going to be a golf cart, this is going to be a Ferrari”(Bloomberg risk takers). Their goal was accomplished by following the mission to prove that Silicon Valley smarts could show Detroit something that Detroit did not think was possible. Though the technology was being developed and researched the company was facing financial hardship. This was a critical time in the company’s history, instead of liquidating the company and cutting their losses, Elon rose to the challenge and became the CEO of Tesla motors. Elon now as the CEO came to the conclusion that they needed a strong partner that can help them on their hunt to green transportation if they wish to succeed. The company that Elon coveted to support Tesla on their journey was Daimler Mercedes. In order to prove their legitimacy as a company they were required to prove to Daimler that their technology of battery power drive trains was adaptable to the current products that Daimler produced. The innovative task in front of them was a daunting one as they pushed to replace the internal combustion engine of a smart car with the battery powered drive train that was produced by Tesla, all within an allotted 4-week time span. This was extremely innovative concept at the time as the smart car was not even available for sale in the United States yet. To complete this task Tesla had to purchase a European model smart car and transport it back to the United States where they could build the first ever electric smart car in the world. Four weeks later the CEO of Daimler took his first ride in a car with the electric drive train and it proved successful as Elon and Tesla came out of the mobile sales pitch with a 70 million dollar contract to produce electric smart car batteries. This is when Tesla came up with the concept of their Model S and their dream of successful electric transportation while maintaining a high performance level was realized.

Tesla has a very simple design to their cars with dynamic aspects, they are built from the ground up. Every Tesla car is built starting with a lithium-ion battery just like the type that powers laptops. The only difference between a Tesla battery and your lap tops is that the Tesla engineers have optimized the power out put. Each Tesla car has one “battery” however this one battery is comprised of thousands of separate cells that average out to a weight of approximately one thousand pounds. The engineers also developed the batteries so that they would be able to operate in a cold surrounding by installing internal heating systems. The interesting part about Tesla’s drive train is that they use two separate motors that are each only about the size of a watermelon. These two motors are the key drivers of the Tesla’s operating system as they provide Tesla the ability to produce 443 foot pounds of torque at zero rpm in a basic Model S. This process of immediate power has proven extremely successful as the Tesla Model S has again and again beat the competition through several tests not only with other electric cars but also with modern combustion engines. If a picture is worth a thousand words a video is worth exponentially more. In the video included above the Tesla Model S drag races a quarter mile against a BMW M5. This was done for the 2013 edition of Automobile Magazine end of year testing. By producing a battery that is this effective and powerful Tesla Motors has created a large competitive advantage that puts them on top of all other electric cars currently being manufactured, as well as dominating performance over several other high end cars that have internal combustion engines.

Though Tesla is the dominant performer in the green car industry, their not the only ones playing. Tesla has motivated several other companies such as Chevrolet and Nissan to push towards the electric car industry. Former General Motors chairman Bob Lutz supervised the launch of the Chevrolet volt. The idea behind the volt was to create a compelling electric car that could be mass produced and “compete with the Tesla model S”(Bloomberg risk takers). By Bob Lutz saying this in an interview you can take away that Tesla did in fact push this large wealthy giant of a company to chase the idea that Tesla created and made into a reality.

In order to understand how advanced Tesla’s technology is I believe it is necessary to draw a comparison from other cars that are vary similar to Tesla’s Model s. All cars within this segment will be compared using their 2016 model. First I will compare the Tesla Model s too the Chevrolet volt. The biggest difference between the Tesla Model S and the Chevrolet volt is that the Chevrolet volt is not a full EV or electric vehicle. The car actually has a 1.5 liter 4-cylinder internal combustion engine that kicks in after the car has driven it original 50 miles than can be reached by the electric battery alone. Tesla CEO Elon Musk was quoted in an

interview calling the Chevrolet volt an “amphibious car, that operates okay as a gas powered car and okay as an electric however its not great as either”. Although the Green hunt is on and these cars can provide impressive numbers with regards to mpg and efficiency, the problem that they still have is they produce carbon emissions. Tesla’s Model S is fully electric therefore they have zero carbon emissions.

The second comparison to be made is between the Tesla Model S and the Nissan Leaf. The Nissan leaf has an approximate drive capacity 107 miles before requiring a charge. This number has increased in the past year from their 84 miles of range. The increase in range is due to an upgrade of their battery to a 30kw/H. This is directly attributed to the consumer demand for longer lasting battery life. If the longest lasting battery on the market was the Nissan Leaf’s then there would be no pressure for improvement. However this is not the case; Nissan and all other companies have been forced to catch up to the leader of battery range that is Tesla. According to Tesla’s website, the new 2016 Model S has the ability to travel up to 435km on a single charge. Although Tesla has again proven that their battery is the best and highest performing on the market, this doesn’t mean that they have stopped innovating.

Tesla pushes not only The EV market but also pushes the performance and luxury car markets as well. This year Tesla has released a new Model S P90D edition car that has approximately 532 horse power, 713 lb feet of torque, and can go from 0-100km per hour in only 3.0 seconds when in their “ludicrous” sport mode. This newly innovated product that Tesla has released to the market is not all performance however, they also have some extremely innovative updates that surpass anything that on the market. Tesla has created a feature that’s incorporated into the common cruise control setting that it allows the car to drive itself. At first it looked as if Tesla was biting off more than they could chew by installing an auto pilot system. This new system is illustrated and explained further by performance drive in the video. This innovative software that is attached to the supercomputer within the Model S is a critical aspect of what gives Tesla a competitive advantage not over just the EV market but over the luxury car market as well.

Tesla executives went another step forward to challenge the current status quo by bringing Tesla public. This was the first large IPO of a car company since Henry Ford became public. This IPO was such a success that Tesla’s net worth rose to almost 2 billion dollars. This was again a situation where Tesla threw a curve ball at the current trends of the big 3 and by doing so caught them off guard. GM came to the conclusion that they had to act now to match Tesla by offering up their own IPO. This IPO was the largest initial public offering in US history, “GM sold 478 million common shares at $33 each, raising $15.77 billion, as well as $4.35 billion

in preferred shares” (Reuters.com). Even though the larger “Goliath” GM corporation did raise exponentially more money than the “David” sized company Tesla, the action that Tesla completed first inspired GM to also release an IPO and therefore provided innovation and drive for a industry and that wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for Tesla.

Webster’s Dictionary defines innovation as “the act or process of introducing new ideas, devices, or methods”. Since day one Tesla has faced adversity as they push to enter the market in non ideal conditions. By this definition you can say that Tesla motors it self is on large piece of innovation. The have brought new concepts of electric powered drive trains that are fueled purely by lithium ion batteries to the market. They have stabilized the economy by releasing an IPO where individuals had an opportunity to buy a portion of Tesla through the stock market. Tesla pushes Big 3 car companies by making strategic moves such as IPO’s and new Model releases in a way that forces them to either follow or fail. Tesla also has introduced to the market an advanced version of cruse control called auto pilot that allows the car to drive its self when on the highway. In summery Tesla has released to the market a premium product that has better fuel efficiency than a Prius while maintaining performance that is at a higher level than several other sports cars that are on the market right now. Though out this blog post I have used the word pushes along with synonyms several times, when comparing Tesla to several other car manufacturers. This is because Tesla in its entirety is innovation, they are a relatively new company when compared to other car manufacturers that have created new devices that have been released to the market with the ability to do different tasks such as auto pilot in ways that we thought before to be impossible. By pushing to constantly innovate and by raising the bar for all other vehicles both electric and modern combustion engine Tesla has changed the car market forever. That is what innovation truly is, change for the better, change for efficiency, and in todays society change for green.

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