Elon Musk, Google, Tesla, Solar City, Uber, let's imagine for a minute, just what they could be thinking about? Just a few short weeks ago : Elon Musk Says Autopilot And Self-Parking Almost Ready For Release
According to a couple of announcements via Twitter from Elon Musk earlier today (July 31, 2015) self steering on the highway as well as self parking are all but ready to be thrown at Tesla Model S owners via an over-the-air update soon. Additionally, Tesla Model S’s will learn to adapt to changing road conditions that might alter how the Tesla sees the white painted line on the side of the road as a guide marker for steering the car.
Google were an early investor in Tesla (at one stage almost buying them out) Remember that Google is an early investor in Tesla
Tesla's third round included investment from prominent entrepreneurs including Google co-founders Sergey Brin & Larry Page, former eBay President Jeff Skoll, Hyatt heir Nick Pritzker and added the VC firms Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Capricorn Management and The Bay Area Equity Fund managed by JPMorgan Chase
And of course Google have been testing an autonomous vehicle for a number of years
The state of Nevada passed a law on June 29, 2011, permitting the operation of autonomous cars in Nevada, after Google had been lobbying in that state for robotic car laws" In 2012, the test group of vehicles included six Toyota Prius, an Audi TT, and three Lexus RX450h,[14] each accompanied in the driver's seat by one of a dozen drivers with unblemished driving records and in the passenger seat by one of Google's engineers. By May 2015, that fleet consisted solely of 23 Lexus SUVs
What would happen if you put this all together?
A couple more initiatives that Tesla have underway include a supercharger network being built across the US, Europe and planned for Australia. Which, if you purchase a Tesla and use these to re-charge, are free, forever.
Supercharger stations charge your car very quickly and be on your way something that's unique about the supercharger - that it's free - it's not just free now it's free forever
YouTube Video
493 Supercharger Stations are currently installed across the world
Supercharger stations in Europe
United States
Australia
Add an autonomous charging station which is kinda creepy Goodbye humans! Tesla's new 'Snakebot' charger slithers into sockets
Along with the Battery Gigafactory which Tesla are building in Nevada, it turns out another Elon Musk company, SolarCity are building their own Gigafactory SolarCity’s Solar Panel “Gigafactory” Resembles Tesla’s Gigafactory So Far
Following on the company’s acquisition of the solar module manufacturer Silevo last year, SolarCity began work on a “Gigafactory” of its own — following in the footsteps of “sister company” Tesla Motors, you might say. The SolarCity version will of course produce solar modules, though, not lithium-ion batteries.
Now comes a very interesting proposition with Uber : Tesla likely to supply cars to Uber in the nearterm and Uber would buy 500,000 cars if Tesla can make them fully self driving
Steve Jurvetson, an early Tesla investor and current company board member, stated that Uber's CEO told him that if Tesla is able to build a fully-functioning autonomous vehicle by 2020, Uber would want to buy 500,000 of them.
Remember Jurveston - invested in Tesla in round 3 along with Google.
What does Musk have to say about this? Well not much really : Elon Musk just hinted at an incredible possible new product
Musk was reportedly asked about a partnership with Uber and waited six seconds to respond. “I don’t think I should, uh, answer it,” Mashable reported him as saying during an earnings call.
So lets recap :
• Google - Detailed geographical mapping software down to the street view level - Note that there is a pretty reasonable chance that the Street view camera car had some serious GPS software on board as it drove around taking happy snaps of everyone's front porch
• Google - almost 4 years of autonomous driving around a number of US states
• Tesla - Electric Car manufacturer (upper market) moving towards a $35K model in next few years
• Tesla - recharge distribution network (aka gas stationesque) roll out underway on 4 continents
• Tesla - Autonomous recharge station technology
• Tesla - Parallel Parking, Auto-Pilot capability in their electric cars
• Tesla - Vehicle Software upgradeable - once the self drive software is perfected, all existing Tesla vehicles would potentially automatically get this update overnight
• Uber - Disruptive ride-share service
• Uber - Possibility of purchasing 500,000 Tesla vehicles if Tesla can get software that allows it's vehicles to drive themselves
• Tesla - Building Gigafactory 1 with the capacity to produce 500,000 vehicles worth of batteries per year, every year from 2020
• SolarCity - Building it's own Gigafactory 1 capable of producing 1GW worth of up to 24% efficient panels per year
Add this all up - Solar powered, automatic, free recharging stations for an electric car that drives itself, can be called to your door from an i-phone app to take you wherever you want to go. Backed by some of the biggest tech names on the planet with proven expertise and capabilities in each of the above areas and if they pull it off, we are looking at an incredible future.
This is the third in a series of diaries which I've put together on where I hope the future is headed and how it's not impossible, that it could actually get there.
200 Gigafactories Part 1
200 Gigafactories Part 2