Posts Tagged: "SolarCity"

Is Elon Musk a Modern Day Rasputin?

Musk also continues to be exposed by news headlines. Twice Musk has delayed his own deadline to reach the 5,000-per-week production goal he has set for Tesla’s Model 3. He’s broken promises not only to his shareholders but also his workforce, 9 percent of which he recently laid off in an attempt to make Tesla into a profitable company. At the time of this writing, Tesla shares were in the $310 price range despite predictions from major investment bank Goldman Sachs that Tesla may need to raise up to $10 billion in capital over the next two years to remain in operation. In late July, The Wall Street Journal reported that Musk asked some of Tesla’s suppliers to refund payments made by the company going back to 2016 in order for Tesla to reach profitability. This news caused a major surge in Tesla credit-default swaps, which now indicate that the company has a 42 percent chance of missing a debt payment in the next five years. Forget meeting production deadlines, Tesla might not have enough cash to keep its doors open within a few short years. Somehow it just doesn’t matter. It is almost as if the more Musk fails the greater his legend grows, and for reasons that make little sense the higher his stock price soars. 

Tesla continues to rack up patents despite Elon Musk’s supposed distaste for patents

For someone who avoids patents “whenever possible,” Musk and his companies sure do seek patents on a lot of innovations. So why can’t he just be honest about his motivations? Or why doesn’t he come out and explain that innovation demands patents and it just isn’t realistic to invest many millions, or in his case sometimes billions, into research and development if you cannot obtain and exercise exclusive rights? That is, after all, perfectly honest and true. You can’t invest in what you can’t own, and Musk knows that. For some reason he just doesn’t seem all that interested in his fans and shareholders realizing that undeniable truth.