Company Management
Elon Musk - CEO |
Karn Budhiraj - VP, Supply Chain |
Lars Moravy - VP, Vehicle Engineering |
Martin Viecha - VP, IR |
Zachary Kirkhorn - CFO |
Analysts
Colin Rusch - Oppenheimer |
Dan Levy - Barclays |
Emmanuel Rosner - Deutsche Bank |
Mark Delaney - Goldman Sachs |
William Stein - Truist |
Question-and-Answer Session
Martin Viecha
Thank you very much, Zach. And let’s go to investor questions. The first question on licensing FSD we’ve already answered. So, let’s go to the second one. The second question is, what is the status of 4680 cells? How far are you from the specs you laid out on Battery Day? When do you expect to achieve what you laid out on Battery Day?
Zachary Kirkhorn
Yes. First, I’ll just start with a little bit of a production update. So, in Texas, 4680 cell production increased 80% Q2 over Q1, and the team surpassed 10 million production cells produced here in Texas. So, congrats to the team for that. Their focus on yield reduced our scrap bill by 40% quarter-over-quarter, and that resulted in a 25% reduction in cell COGS.
Here in Texas, we’re preparing to launch our Cybertruck cell, which is 10% higher energy density than current production. That was accomplished through process and mechanical design optimization. As we scale Cyber cell production through the end of the year and early next, we should be in a comfortable place on cost per cell.
Against our battery energy density targets, the Cyber cell is at our expectations on a like-for-like electrochemistry basis. We’re yet to integrate silicon or in-house cathode production, both reviewed on Battery Day, which do bring significant further energy density and cost improvements, but that is a topic for another day.
Lastly, it is important to remember that most of what we focused on a Battery Day was the Tesla-engineered 4680 production system and the improvements we strove to achieve on equipment, factory density, capital cost and utility cost reduction, all of which we are realizing in our Texas scale up to date.
Martin Viecha
Thank you very much. The next question is, can you talk more to the upcoming Tesla Energy products and how your thinking has evolved on the revenue model? Given Tesla’s AI capabilities, how do you see the long-term mix between hardware margin and recurring software margin from Autobidder as this segment accelerates?
Zachary Kirkhorn
We can’t comment on future product road map, but I can provide a quick energy and Q2 update. Megapack continues to show strong demand globally with Lathrop ramping successfully to meet our contracted projects in 2023. As stated last quarter, Megapack margins are in a reasonable place, in line with our target -- vehicle target margins.
The second final assembly line at Lathrop is progressing on schedule, eventually doubling Lathrop capacity ahead of our full factory ramp in 2024. We have several exciting large projects in construction or nearing completion, including the KES project in Hawaii, the Riverina project in Australia, several products in California and one here at Gigafactory, Texas that we’ll tour today, actually. We want to thank our customers, utilities and grid operators for trusting us with these projects.
On the Autobidder question, we continue to grow Autobidder contracts in wholesale markets like Australia, Texas, UK and California with over 6 gigawatt hours under Tesla’s dispatch next year. In the UK, our projects performed best in the industry in Q2. Autobidder does have software margins and is an enabler for hardware sales, but it’s a relatively small contributor to revenues, given how much deployment growth on the Megapack hardware side is occurring. It’s important to remember that these large projects -- these large capital projects have lifetimes of 20 years of recurring revenues on an annualized basis relative to upfront CapEx are small.
On the residential side, we have some fun things happening. We recently surpassed 0.5 million Powerwalls installed. Just this week, we are launching Charge on Solar, which allows Tesla Powerwall and vehicle customers to charge their vehicles using their excess solar and drive only on the sunshine that hits their roof. Yesterday, we began paying customers in Texas for participating in our virtual power plant to provide grid support to ERCOT. We expect these credits to lower our median customer’s annual bill by a third and to increase these credits over time as ERCOT expands market access. And today, we are expanding Tesla electric enrollment to new Model 3 owners in Texas, followed by all Texas vehicle customers over the rest of the quarter.
Unfortunately and somewhat similar to Tesla Insurance, bringing Tesla electric and BPP capabilities to our customers requires working through a fractured regulatory environment on a jurisdiction-by-jurisdiction basis. In the long run, the value of residential energy software and hardware will be driven by the level of market access that utilities, market operators and regulators permit.
For Powerwall that’s eligible to provide the full stack of energy services, like peaker capacity and system buffering, such as in Australia, we can more than double the value of ownership relative to a typical system today.
Martin Viecha
Thank you very much. The next question is, could you quantify the benefits to COGS per unit from the IRA battery manufacturing incentives; and secondly, battery raw material declines year-to-date?
Zachary Kirkhorn
All right. I can take that. On the first part of the question for IRA manufacturing incentives, we provided previous guidance that we expect these to be for the course of this year in the range of $150 million to $250 million per quarter. We are staying within that boundary as we guided previously, so that was the case in Q2 as well. I will note, and I think we’ve mentioned this before, that this includes a 50-50 sharing of credits for qualified cells from our long-term battery partner, Panasonic.
On the commodity side, we are continuing to see improvements there, as we’ve discussed previously. Lithium is the most notable improvement so far. I think I commented on this on the last call, because typically, we see this coming about a quarter before it actually is realized in our financials. And also just as a reminder, we’re not fully exposed to the price of lithium. Our supply chain team has done a terrific job in partnership with another -- a bunch of other companies to put in place some long-term agreements here, but we do have some exposure that moves up and down.
We’re also seeing benefits in aluminum and steel, which I think is great. Not as large as the lithium impacts, but they contribute nonetheless. So, if we add up the total impact of this in Q2 relative to prior quarter, it’s about the same size and magnitude as the IRA benefits that we also received.
Just to put this in context, as you look at COGS per unit sequentially from Q1 to Q2, I think there’s two things to keep in mind there. The first is that our SX mix for deliveries increased quite a bit from Q1 to Q2. So, as you think about fundamental cost reductions, it’s important to adjust for that. And then secondly, as we continue to work on reducing our Austin and Berlin cost, which we did quite a bit of that from Q1 to Q2, these factories are still slightly above Model Y production costs elsewhere. And in the quarter, our mix of Austin and Berlin related builds increased. And so, that’s something to consider as you model out the impact on -- from Q1 to Q2 in terms of COGS per unit.
I do want to ask Karn if there’s anything else on the commodity side or just more generally, you want to add here?
Karn Budhiraj
Yes. As you mentioned, Zach, we’ve naturally been a little bit hedged from the lithium position because of the long-term contracts we have in place. But we have seen reduction in pricing across the board for all commodities that specifically go into batteries such as nickel, cobalt and graphite. And the reductions in pricing translate into thousands of dollars when you look at it from a per-vehicle impact. We’re taking advantage of the historically low commodity pricing and certainly I ask to kind of extend some of those fixed price contracts through the end of the decade. So it’s a playbook that we’ll continue to kind of go back to as we look to the future.
Martin Viecha
Thank you. The next question on FSD. Have you considered allowing FSD transferability as a lever to allow existing customers to upgrade to a new Tesla instead of being locked into an existing car due to the price of FSD?
Elon Musk
Yes. This is a question we get asked a lot. So, we’re excited to announce that for Q3, we will be allowing transfer of FSD. This is a onetime amnesty. So, it needs to be -- you need to take advantage of it in Q3, but -- or at least place the order in Q3 within reasonable delivery time frames. So yes, I hope this makes people happy. This is a onetime thing.
Martin Viecha
Right. The next question, when will we give more information about the Cybertruck orders, estimated delivery schedules, pricing and specifications?
Elon Musk
Demand is so far off the hook, you can’t even see the hook. So, that’s really not an issue. I do want to emphasize that the Cybertruck has a lot of new technology in it, like a lot. It doesn’t look like -- it doesn’t look like any other vehicle because it is not like any other vehicle. So -- and the production ramp will move as fast as the slowest and least likely elements of the entire supply chain and internal production. So, I wouldn’t expect -- I hope it’s smooth. We’re certainly better at production ramps that -- we’ve got a lot of experience with the production ramps. But first order approximation, there’s like 10,000 unique parts and processes in the Cybertruck. And if any one of -- it will go as fast as the least lucky, least well-executed element of the 10,000. So, it’s always difficult to predict the ramp initially, but I think we’ll be making them in high volume next year, and we will be delivering the car this year.
Martin Viecha
Thank you. The next question is critics of Gigacasting contended that process makes vehicles harder and more costly to repair, essentially pushing costs on to the customer. Can you share some details about the initial repair experience with Gigacast vehicles?
Elon Musk
That must be why everyone’s copying us.
Lars Moravy
Thanks, Elon. This is Lars. I mean, that’s like simply not true. There’s a misconception that traditional bodies are easy to repair, but they are made up of multiple materials and multiple joining methods. Spot welds and rivets have to be drilled out. Panels and structural adhesives have to be chiseled out. Dried adhesive has to be removed, stains, cut, blah, blah, blah.
Elon Musk
It’s a crazy patch of a quilt.
Lars Moravy
Yes. And so putting that back together means time and money. Using an example of replacing a rear cast rail in the Model Y, to do that versus like what we replaced it with from Model 3, it’s 10 times cheaper and 3 times faster to do it with the cast rail. Design team works with our collision repair team since we’re a closed loop on this with insurance, and we design specific parts that make it easier and faster to repair. And we have an incentive to do that because we have our own insurance and our own body shops. We expect that we’ll continue to do this, and collision repair will continue to become cheaper and faster over time. And we already make this available to all body shops or our Tesla-approved body shop training.
Elon Musk
Yes, closing loop on collision repair and factoring that into design is a big deal.
Lars Moravy
Crucial. I don’t think anyone else can do it with that ecosystem that we have, so.
Elon Musk
Yes. And we are actually able to change the details of the casting with inserts, and we actually do that all the time, so -- because the inserts actually wear out and need to be replaced anyway. So we can actually make design changes to the inserts and tweak the castings. But the cast --basically cast rear body or front body is lighter, cheaper, better noise vibration, harshness, much easier to manufacture. It’s better in every way. And that’s why so many other car companies are copying us.
Lars Moravy
Probably.
Elon Musk
Well, they certainly put out a lot of press releases about it. I think it’s basically going to be how all cars are made in the future.
Martin Viecha
Thank you. Next question, how many Optimus bots have been made? And when will they be able to start performing useful tasks?
Elon Musk
10 million. Yes. I think we’re around 5 or 6 bots. I think -- there’s -- we were -- look, 10, I guess. Depends on what -- how many are working and what phase. But it’s sort of -- yes, there’s more every month. There’s a lot of interesting things about the Optimus bot. We found that there are actually no suppliers that can produce the actuators. There are no off-the-shelf actuators that work well for humanoid robot at any price.
Unidentified Company Representative
Certainly not compelling.
Elon Musk
Yes. There’s not a humanoid robot that can do something -- the things that human could do. So, we’ve actually had to design our own actuators that integrate the motor or the power electronics, the controller, the sensors. And really, every one of them is custom designed. And then, of course, we’ll be using the same inference hardware as the car. But we are, in designing these actuators, designing them for volume production. So, they’re not just lighter, tighter and more capable than any other actuators wherever that exists in the world, but it’s also actually manufacturable. So, we should be able to make them in volume.
The first Optimus is that will have all of the Tesla designed actuators, sort of production candidate actuators integrated and walking should be around November-ish. And then, we’ll start ramping up after that. In terms of when we’ll be able to do some useful things, like we’ll first be trying this out in our own factories and just proving out its utility, but I think we’ll be able to have it do something useful in our factories sometime next year. I would be -- yes, I’m pretty confident of that. So yes, it’s going well.
I should say another cool thing about Optimus is that there’s -- just in the U.S. alone, there are 2 million amputees. And I was just talking to the Neuralink team. And by combining a Neuralink implant and a robotic arm or leg for someone that has had their arm or leg or arms and legs amputated, we believe we can give basically a cyber body that is incredibly capable, $6 million man in real life, before don’t want to cost $6 million. $60,000 man. This sounds impressive, but it will actually -- so that actually could be a really -- I think, would be incredible to potentially help people around the world and give them a robot arm or like that is as good, maybe long term better than a biological one.
Martin Viecha
Thank you. The next question is, how has the order intake trended relatively to production levels during Q2? And how has it trended in the quarter-to-date period? Conceptually, how does Tesla decide when is it appropriate to reduce prices or at other sales incentives to increase demand?
Elon Musk
Yes. I guess, demand has roughly tracked production. So which is what we aim for is that it’s something that we have that really -- I think no other carmaker has -- is that we have real-time demand and real-time production, like so seven days a week. I get an e-mail -- order generated e-mail, chose output from all factories and orders globally. So it’s like a real-time finger on the pulse of earth basically. And we adjust course according to what the mood of the public is.
Buying a new car is a big decision for vast majority of people. So, any time there’s economic uncertainty, people generally pause on new car buying at least to see what happens. And then obviously, another challenge is the interest rate environment. As interest rates rise, the affordability of anything bought with debt decreases, so effectively increasing the price of the car.
So when interest rates rise dramatically, we actually have to reduce the price of the car because the interest payments increase the price of the car. And this is -- at least up until recently, it was, I believe, the sharpest interest rate rise in history. So, we had to do something about that. If somebody’s got a crystal ball for the global economy, I really appreciate it, if I could borrow that crystal ball.
Unidentified Company Representative
DM us.
Elon Musk
Yes, exactly, DM me. It should be not on Twitter. So, I mean, one day, it seems like the world economy is falling apart and the next day, everything is fine. I don’t know what’s going on. It’d be totally fine. I wish I did. So, I mean that’s why I say like I was on Twitter, I posted like just really advising because I care a lot about the sort of small shareholders, especially ones that have stuck with us through thick and thin. I love you, guys. And so, we can’t control these macro shocks or the thematic depressive nature of the stock market. So, that’s why I recommend against margin loans in times that are turbulent. If times are not that turbulent, actually margin loan can be a smart move within reason. But we’re in, I would call it, turbulent times. Like I have very high confidence in the long-term value of Tesla. Like I see it -- I really see a path to a 10x -- call it a 5x increase in the value of the company, maybe a 10x. And -- but where things go along the way, the trials and tribulations and the mood of the markets, one cannot predict. And so, the old adage of buy and hold is right. For an investment advice, I’d say like identifying a company as products you love. See if they -- does it seem like they’ll continue to make good products or great products? Buy that stock and hold it. That’s it. You’ll win.
The reason companies exist is to make goods and services, ideally great goods and services. They don’t exist for any other reason. They shouldn’t. So, that’s why you should buy stock of a company that makes good products and has a great future pipeline. It’s common sense, actually.
And then generally, if you see -- if you provide your confidence about what that company’s products or services are, when the market panics, buy; and when the market is overly exuberant, you can sell. I’m not recommending you to Tesla, but yes, buy low, sell high.
Warren Buffett actually, I think has a saying -- I’m paraphrasing him, but a publicly traded company is like imagine living in your house and some crazy manic-depressive guy comes and stands outside your house and yells property prices at you, and it’s a different price every day. But the house is still the same house. So, this is a stock market. Credit that to Warren Buffett.
Martin Viecha
Thank you. Let’s go to the next question. With the emphasis of price cuts to drive volume growth eating into automotive gross margin, can investors expect to see automotive gross margin stabilize or even rise due to efficiencies outpacing the cuts? And if so, when?
Elon Musk
Where’s that crystal ball, again? If I may, look, the short-term variances in gross margin and profitability really are minor relative to the long-term picture. Autonomy will make all of these numbers look silly. I’d recommend looking at ARK Invest. I think their analysis is very good. It’s the best. And generally, Fintwit or the finance, Smart Finance people on Twitter, follow their accounts. They’re great. So that’s in my opinion where you’ll get the best info. So, I strongly believe Tesla is a big long-term investment. And don’t sweat when things go up and down. In fact, if the market panics, buy; if the market is a little too exuberant, sell at the time. But just generally, I’m confident we’ll deliver over long term, but can’t control short term. So -- and the autonomy is really where it’s at. I mean, Zachary?
Zachary Kirkhorn
I fully agree with you. I mean, I think the only thing in the short term that matters is what I said in my opening remarks, which is are we generating enough money to continue to invest. And the portfolio of products and technologies that the technical teams are investing in right now, this is intense. It’s intense in terms of investment; it’s intense in terms of potential.
Elon Musk
Frankly, I think it’s ridiculous that we have positive free cash flow in a capital-intensive business, while investing massive amounts of money in new technology. That is super hard.
Unidentified Company Representative
And vertical integration. It’s not even just like new products, but also...
Elon Musk
Yes. We actually make our share...
Zachary Kirkhorn
And so, at least from my perspective, what matters is continuing to generate the cash to invest. That means continuing to be hyper focused on near-term cost reduction. Is everything we do in near-term cost reduction provides capital to reinvest? Hyper-focused on working capital management, which we’ve made quite a bit of progress there on the raw materials and with -- a set of that we’ve been very focused on accounts receivables as well to ensure that we can continue to reinvest the cash. This is what we’re focused on. And so, there’s a set of this that we control. We have a pipeline of cost reductions. We are getting tailwinds in the commodity space right now, as Karn mentioned, that’s helpful.
Variability around average selling prices goes back to Elon’s point. We don’t control interest rates. We don’t control macro consumer sentiment. But we have an obligation to be responsive to that to ensure that we’re matching supply and demand and keeping things balanced. And so, this is how we’re managing the next handful of quarters. Soon enough, these quarters will be behind us. They won’t be part of the present value of future cash flows of the business. And so, we want to make sure we keep that view and make sure that the long term business is exactly the way that we want it to be.
Martin Viecha
All right. Thank you very much. Now let’s go to analyst questions. The first question comes from Dan Levy from Barclays.
Dan Levy
I wanted to start first with a question about your efforts in AI and Dojo. It’s pretty clear it sounds like you’re accelerating your focus. Can you maybe provide us with a sense of what the process is of refining a product? Is it more machines? And maybe you could give us a sense of when the payout starts to -- when you start to see the payout and what the resource outlay is, what should we expect on the OpEx front as a result of this?
Elon Musk
Sorry. Are you saying how much are we going to spend on Dojo or…?
Dan Levy
Yes.
Elon Musk
R&D on Dojo?
Dan Levy
Yes.
Elon Musk
Well, we’re not going to be open loop on our Dojo expenditures. So -- but I mean, I think we will be spending something north of $1 billion over the next year on -- through the next year, it’s well over $1 billion in Dojo. And yes, so I mean we’ve got a truly staggering amount of video data to do training on. And this is another thing -- in order to copy us, you also need to spend billions of dollars on training compute. I mean, it’s like -- and it’s also hard to -- you need the data and you need the training computer. It’s like -- think, well, things needed to actually achieve this at scale toward generalized solution for autonomy, it’s -- this is one of the highest problems ever.
You see a lot of AI companies doing LLMs and whatnot. I would say if they’re so great, why can’t they make a self-driving car? Because it’s harder. That’s why. So -- but I do think -- I think there’s some great AI companies out there. But just fundamentally, the staggering amount of data we’ve got to process, it’s got to be processed somehow. And custom silicon is the best way to do that.
So that’s what Dojo is designed to do is optimize for video training. It’s not optimized for LLMs. It’s optimized for video training. With video training, you have a much higher ratio of compute-to-memory bandwidth, so -- whereas LLMs tends to be memory bandwidth choked. So that’s it. I mean -- but like I said, we’re also -- we have some -- we’re using a lot of NVIDIA hardware. We’ll continue to -- we’ll actually take NVIDIA hardware as fast as NVIDIA will deliver it to us. Tremendous respect for Jensen and NVIDIA. They’ve done an incredible job.
And frankly, I don’t know if they could deliver us enough GPUs, we might not need Dojo, but they can’t. So they’ve got so many customers. They’ve been kind enough to nonetheless, prioritize some of our GPU orders. But yes, the sheer magnitude of video training -- because like I said, we’re not trying to just get as good as human. We want to get to 10 times better than human, maybe 100 times better than human.
Right now, I believe there’s something on the order of 1 million automotive deaths per year. And then if you say permanent serious injuries, I think it’s probably closer to 10 million per year. And -- so it matters if you’re twice as good as human, 10 times -- like 10 times better than human would still mean 100,000 deaths and 1 million severe permanent injuries. So, it’s like, okay, we would rather be 100 times better. So there’s really -- it’s a march of 9s, and we want to achieve as perfect safety as possible. And that’s truly mind-boggling amounts of video and computer needed for that. And then, I do think there’s other applications for Dojo, but we just desperately need it for video training.
Zachary Kirkhorn
Just to add to what Elon mentioned. So, the numbers that he mentioned are between R&D spend and capital spend. And this is moving quickly. And so, we provide a three-year outlook on our capital expense. We are considering these expenses in that outlook. And as that moves up and down, we’ll continue to update our guidance in the Q.
Elon Musk
Yes. I want to say, the fundamental rate limiter on the progress of full self-driving is training. That’s -- if we had more training compute, we would get it done faster. So that’s it.
Zachary Kirkhorn
And it’s just difficult to predict how quickly we can execute on it.
Dan Levy
Great. Thank you. Just as a follow-up, I recognize there’s incredible macro uncertainty right now, but you’re sticking with your near term, your volume target of 50% CAGR. As we just think about sort of in the year ahead, Cybertruck is going to be some contribution. There’s going to be some help from further EV penetration growth. But to what extent are you willing to sacrifice on pricing to keep that 50% volume CAGR intact, or are you thinking differently about margins versus your prior commentary of willing to sacrifice on margins to get more share?
Elon Musk
It’s not about getting more share. It’s just that you can think of every car that we sell or produce that has full autonomy capability as actually something that in the future may be worth as much as 5 times what it is today. Because average -- vehicle is doing like maybe 10 hours of driving a week. If sort of -- if this says 1.5 hours a day on average, that’s 10 hours a week-ish. If you’ve got on autonomous -- if the vehicle is able to operate autonomously and use either dedicated autonomous or partially autonomous like Airbnb, like maybe sometimes you allow your car to be used by others. Sometimes you want to use it exclusively just like Airbnb -- doing Airbnb with a room in your house. The value is just tremendous.
So, I think it’s sort of, it would be -- I think it -- it does make sense to sacrifice margins in favor of making more vehicles because we think in the not too distant future, they will have a dramatic valuation increase. I think the Tesla fleet value increase at the point which we can upload full self-driving and is approved by regulators will be the single biggest step change in asset value maybe in history.
Martin Viecha
Thank you. Let’s go to the next analyst. The question comes from Emmanuel Rosner from Deutsche Bank.
Emmanuel Rosner
Two questions from me as well. First, following up on the autonomy. So before you start launching these dedicated robotaxi vehicles, on existing vehicles, you’re improving FSD incrementally. What is your latest targeted timing to essentially release a non-beta version or an eyes-off version that would trigger much higher take rates? And would Tesla benefit from lowering the price of FSD?
Elon Musk
Well, obviously, as people have sort of made fun of me and perhaps quite fairly have made fun of me, my predictions about achieving full self-driving have been optimistic in the past. The reason I’ve been optimistic is -- it tends to look like is the -- we’ll make rapid progress with a new version of FSD, but then it will curve over logarithmically. So first, logarithmic curve looks like just sort of fairly straight upward line, diagonally up. And so, if you extrapolate that, then you have a great thing. But then because it’s actually logarithmic, it curves over, and then there have been a series of stacked logarithmic curves.
Now, I’m the boy who cried FSD, but I think we’ll be better than human by the end of this year. That’s not to say we’re approved by regulators. And I’m saying that would be in the U.S. because we’ve got to focus on one market first. But I think we’ll be better than human by the end of this year. I’ve been wrong in the past, I may be wrong this time.
And the price of FSD -- so the great thing is the price of FSD is actually very low, it’s not high. When you go back to what I said earlier, the value of the car increases dramatically if it is actually autonomous. $15,000 is actually a low price, not a high price. And we will offer -- and we -- I think we do sort of offer FSD as a sort of monthly subscription, although most people don’t know that. So, I’d recommend like maybe trying it out as a monthly subscription so you don’t have to go with the $15,000 thing. But I think yes, yes -- obviously, if the car is worth several times its original price, $15,000 is actually a low price for FSD.
Martin Viecha
And the next question comes from William Stein from Truist.
William Stein
I’d like to ask about -- to stick on this AI topic. We’ve read with great interest the developments in Dojo today, and you’ve spoken about FSD, but you’ve also -- Elon, you started this x.ai company. And for investors that think that there might be quite a bit of value in the AI features and products of Tesla, it might be concerning to see you pursuing another endeavor where AI is the focus. So can you talk about how x.ai might overlap, might perhaps compete with Tesla or in other ways, perhaps it enhances the value of what Tesla does?
Elon Musk
Yes. I think it’ll actually enhance the value of Tesla. There were just some of the world’s best AI engineers and scientists that were willing to join a startup, but they were not willing to join a large sort of relatively established company like Tesla. So, it was like -- that’s actually how it got started. I was interviewing a few people and they’re like, no, we want to do a startup. I was like, and that’s well -- I couldn’t convince them to join Tesla. So -- so it’s like, okay, well, better to start up that I run than go work somewhere else. That’s kind of the genesis of xAI.
And xAI is focused on sort of AGI. Yes. So it’s -- like I said, I think there will be some value that xAI brings to Tesla. Also some of the best -- for the very best people in the world, they really just want to work on interesting problem. So if you take, say, a material science group, really what convinced Charlie Colman to leave Apple, where he was very happy and well compensated, and both at -- in both -- where we think is the best material science group in the world, was that he got to work at both Tesla and SpaceX. He wasn’t willing to leave Apple if it was just Tesla, but he’s willing to do it if it is Tesla and SpaceX. So sometimes you get the best talent in the world if that’s the kind of thing you need to do. And that actually has been very beneficial to Tesla.
William Stein
If I could squeeze one more mundane question in. I wonder if you think you can hit the 1.8 million unit number with current pricing, or do you anticipate needing to continue to lower prices because it seems like they’ve stabilized. The trends have stabilized in the last maybe 1.5 months. Should we expect sort of continued decreases or more stabilization for the rest of the year?
Elon Musk
Sure. We have sort of -- we started the referral program, which I think will be quite effective. As Zach was saying earlier, we don’t control the macroeconomic conditions. So, if interest rates continue to rise, that reduces the affordability of cars. And for a lot of people, they’re really -- they’re just really breaking even every month. In fact, if you look at the rise in credit card debt, they are, in fact, not breaking even every month. Credit card debt is looking scary. So, we just don’t control the market conditions. If market condition is stable, I think prices will be stable. If they’re not stable, then we would have lower prices. Yes.
Martin Viecha
Thank you. Let’s go to Colin Rusch from Oppenheimer.
Colin Rusch
As you’re building out Dojo and implementing what truly is going to be a highly complex set of software, can you speak to the maturity of the operating system and how much outsourced software you’re expecting to use in that system?
Elon Musk
This is a custom software stack, so. But it is designed such that you can run at a high level, PyTorch and JAX. But then we have to customize it to actually run on a custom silicon. So, the software stack is a combination of open source software and then Tesla software all the way to the bare silicon, which is the case for the inference computer in the car.
Colin Rusch
Okay. Thanks so much. That’s super helpful. And then can you speak to how you’re managing some of the geopolitical risks relative to your capacity expansion? Obviously, as you guys continue to grow at this rate, you’re going to be putting some folks out of business. And there’s going to be some impacts around regional economy. So, I just want to understand how you’re thinking about that in terms of some of your CapEx plans and how you’re managing some of those relationships with different countries and regions.
Elon Musk
Well, this is a period of unusual geopolitical risk. So, I think we’re -- the best we can do is have factories in many parts of the world such that if things get difficult in one part of the world, we can still keep things going in the rest of the world.
Martin Viecha
Thank you. The next question comes from Mark Delaney from Goldman Sachs.
Mark Delaney
Tesla has been making progress reducing costs and did so again last quarter. Can you give an update on when you think automotive COGS per vehicle could be under the historical $36,000 per vehicle level? And what are the key puts and takes to get there?
Zachary Kirkhorn
This is -- I think I was asked this in the past. This is very difficult to forecast. There’s a series of costs that we manage, the series of costs which we don’t control. And so particularly on the commodity side, where labor costs go, et cetera, it’s just hard to say.
Elon Musk
Yes. And we saw very inflationary -- like strong inflationary pressures for a while last year. And now -- which obviously makes it very difficult to reduce COGS. And now we’re seeing what seems to be deflationary pressures, certainly deflationary -- deflation isn’t pressure. But we’re seeing commodity prices dropping as was mentioned, as Karn mentioned a moment ago. I mean, I don’t know, what do you think? I mean, basically, the trends seem to be deflationary at the commodity level.
Karn Budhiraj
Definitely. There’s that. And then there’s also the unit economics improve as volumes grow. That’s the other thing we’re seeing. As we’re becoming a bigger and better part of a lot of suppliers, the economies of scale come into play. There’s equipment depreciation that comes into play, equipment that was commissioned 5 to 7 years ago. That used to be a part of the piece price. That’s completely amortized. So, we’ll see situation where piece price comes down because that equipment contribution has gone away.
And then just we continue to have this mentality of continuous improvement in terms of labor, reducing labor, improving automation, and just continue to get better at what we do. So we have seen -- I think every quarter, we have seen an improvement. Of course, the commodities spiked up and down. Just in general, the trend is towards being more efficient.
Zachary Kirkhorn
Yes, I’m totally agreeing.
Elon Musk
Yes, lithium prices were absolutely insane there for a while.
Zachary Kirkhorn
Yes. And they’re recovering now.
Karn Budhiraj
Cobalt -- the way it used to be.
Zachary Kirkhorn
Yes. And we’re still early in the ramp -- well, not early in the ramp, but early in the cost down curve of Austin and Berlin. And so, it takes time to work the cost out it. First, it’s a focus on ramp -- ramp, it brings cost down...
Elon Musk
And quality costs…
Zachary Kirkhorn
Yes. And then once that stabilizes, we can divert bandwidth to cost reduction. And so Austin and Berlin saw quite a decent amount of cost reduction on a fundamental basis from Q1 to Q2. We’ll continue to do that work that will be helpful. And so we’re just going to keep chipping away at it.
Unidentified Company Representative
Packaging is a big element to that.
Elon Musk
Yes, logistics…
Zachary Kirkhorn
Logistics is normalizing, which is great.
Unidentified Company Representative
[Indiscernible] utilization, something that the team has been very focused on. So, every bit of it.
Zachary Kirkhorn
Yes, and it’s hard...
Elon Musk
Logistics is underappreciated. Yes, so sold saying goes like valves and with tactics as one with logistics.
Unidentified Company Representative
Yes. And we’ve made tremendous improvements in cost in all fronts on expired costs. We have done pre-pandemic expired cost levels now, and our goal is to go further down.
Zachary Kirkhorn
Yes. So when we look at our progress from Q1 to Q2 on cost, the way that we look at internally, normalized for the impacts of mix shift with Austin and Berlin being a higher percentage of our mix, normalized for S and X being a higher percentage of our mix in Q2 versus Q1, the sequential cost reduction, it might be the largest we’ve had in a while. So, I think it’s great work on behalf of the Tesla team, and we just got to keep it up.
Elon Musk
Yes, it’s a game of pennies. It’s a Game of Thrones with pennies.
Martin Viecha
Mark, do you have a follow-up question? I think you’re muted.
Mark Delaney
Yes. Thank you very much for all the details on that. Maybe you could put a finer point on the downtime impact that you spoke about in your prepared comments in terms of production impact and then also to what extent there’s a margin impact from those factory upgrades that you’re planning this quarter?
Zachary Kirkhorn
Yes. The downtime -- we don’t know exactly the number of cars impacted because kind of the way that we go into downtime windows for upgrades is we set aside a period of time, but then the team is challenged to go as quickly as possible so that we can get the factories up and running again and minimize that. It’s not profound reduction. Hopefully, it’s small.
Elon Musk
I think we’re getting too much into the weeds here. I mean, like we’re asking for a level of precision that is not possible to answer. So, let’s move on.
Martin Viecha
Yes. I think this is unfortunately all the time we have for today. So, we’ll speak to you all in the next three months. Thank you very much.
Elon Musk
Thank you.
(Tips:This transcript is converted by recording, we will do our best, but cannot fully guarantee the accuracy of the conversion, it is for reference only.)
公司管理
Elon Musk——首席执行官 |
Karn Budhiraj-供应链副总裁 |
Lars Moravy-车辆工程副总裁 |
Martin Viecha-IR 副总裁 |
Zachary Kirkhorn-首席财务官 |
分析师
Colin Rusch-奥本海默 |
Dan Levy-巴克莱银行 |
Emmanuel Rosner-德意志银行 |
Mark Delaney-高盛 |
William Stein-Truist |
问答环节
Martin Viecha
非常感谢,扎克。让我们来谈谈投资者的问题。我们已经回答了关于许可 FSD 的第一个问题。所以,让我们来看第二个。第二个问题是,4680 电池的状态如何?你离你在 Battery Day 上设定的规格有多远?你预计什么时候能实现你在 Battery Day 上设定的目标?
Zachary Kirkhorn
是的。首先,我将从一些生产更新开始。因此,在得克萨斯州,第二季度4680电池的产量比第一季度增长了80%,该团队在德克萨斯州的产量超过了1000万个。所以,为此向团队表示祝贺。他们对产量的关注使我们的废品账单同比减少了40%,这导致电池COGS减少了25%。
在得克萨斯州,我们正准备推出我们的Cybertruck电池,它的能量密度比目前的产量高出10%。这是通过工艺和机械设计优化实现的。随着我们在今年年底和明年初扩大网络电池的产量,我们应该在每块电池的成本上处于有利地位。
相对于我们的电池能量密度目标,Cybercell 在同类电化学基础上达到了我们的预期。我们还没有整合硅或内部阴极生产,这两者都在电池日进行了审查,这确实带来了进一步的能量密度和成本改善,但这是另一天的话题。
最后,重要的是要记住,我们在电池日上的大部分重点是特斯拉设计的4680生产系统,以及我们在设备、工厂密度、资本成本和公用事业成本降低方面努力实现的改进,所有这些都是我们迄今为止在德克萨斯州的规模中实现的。
Martin Viecha
非常感谢。下一个问题是,你能否更多地谈谈即将推出的特斯拉能源产品,以及你对收入模式的看法是如何演变的?鉴于特斯拉的人工智能能力,随着该细分市场的加速,你如何看待硬件利润率和Autobidder经常性软件利润之间的长期组合?
Zachary Kirkhorn
我们无法评论未来的产品路线图,但我可以提供快速的能量和第二季度更新。随着Lathrop在2023年成功扩张以满足我们的合同项目,Megapack继续在全球范围内表现出强劲的需求。正如上个季度所述,Megapack的利润率处于合理水平,符合我们的目标——汽车目标利润率。
Lathrop的第二条总装线正在按计划进行,最终在2024年我们的工厂全面投入使用之前,Lathrop的产能翻了一番。实际上,我们有几个激动人心的大型项目正在建设或即将完工,包括夏威夷的KES项目、澳大利亚的Riverina项目、加利福尼亚的几种产品以及德克萨斯州Gigafactory的一个产品。我们要感谢客户、公用事业和电网运营商对我们进行这些项目的信任。
关于Autobidder问题,我们将继续增加澳大利亚、德克萨斯州、英国和加利福尼亚等批发市场的Autobidder合同,明年特斯拉将派出超过6千兆瓦时。在英国,我们的项目在第二季度在业内表现最好。Autobidder确实有软件利润率,是硬件销售的推动力,但考虑到Megapack硬件方面的部署增长幅度,它对收入的贡献相对较小。重要的是要记住,与前期资本支出相比,这些大型资本项目 —— 按年计算,这些大型资本项目的周期为20年的经常性收入。
在住宅方面,我们正在发生一些有趣的事情。我们最近安装的 Powerwalls 已超过 50 万个。就在本周,我们将推出Charge on Solar,它允许特斯拉Powerwall和汽车客户使用多余的太阳能为车辆充电,并且只能在照射到车顶的阳光下行驶。昨天,我们开始向德克萨斯州的客户付款,因为他们参与了我们的虚拟发电厂,为ERCOT提供电网支持。我们预计,随着ERCOT扩大市场准入,这些积分将使客户的年度账单中位数降低三分之一,并随着时间的推移增加这些抵免额。今天,我们正在将特斯拉电动汽车的注册人数扩大到德克萨斯州的Model 3新车主,其次是在本季度的剩余时间里,德克萨斯州的所有汽车客户。
不幸的是,与特斯拉保险有点相似,为我们的客户提供特斯拉的电动和BPP能力需要在分裂的监管环境中逐个司法管辖区开展工作。从长远来看,住宅能源软件和硬件的价值将取决于公用事业、市场运营商和监管机构允许的市场准入水平。
对于有资格提供全套能源服务(例如峰值容量和系统缓冲)的Powerwall,例如在澳大利亚,与当今的典型系统相比,我们可以将所有权价值提高一倍以上。
Martin Viecha
非常感谢。下一个问题是,你能否量化IRA电池制造激励措施给每单位COGS带来的好处;其次,电池原材料今年迄今为止的下降?
Zachary Kirkhorn
好吧。我可以接受。关于IRA制造业激励措施问题的第一部分,我们提供了先前的指导,我们预计今年的激励措施将在每季度1.5亿至2.5亿美元之间。正如我们之前所指出的那样,我们将保持在该边界内,因此第二季度也是如此。我要指出,我想我们之前已经提到过,这包括我们的长期电池合作伙伴松下为合格电池提供50-50的积分分享。
在大宗商品方面,正如我们之前所讨论的那样,我们继续看到大宗商品方面的改善。锂是迄今为止最显著的改进。我想我在上次电话会议上对此发表了评论,因为通常,我们看到这在财务状况中实际实现之前大约一个季度。同样提醒一下,我们并没有完全受到锂价格的影响。我们的供应链团队与另一家公司合作做得非常出色——许多其他公司在这里签订了一些长期协议,但我们的风险确实在上下波动。
我们还看到了铝和钢的好处,我认为这很棒。不如锂的冲击那么大,但它们仍然起了作用。因此,如果我们将第二季度的总体影响与上一季度相比加起来,其规模和幅度与我们也获得的IRA福利差不多。
简而言之,当你按顺序查看从第一季度到第二季度每单位的COGS时,我认为有两件事需要记住。首先,从第一季度到第二季度,我们的SX交付组合大幅增加。因此,在考虑基本成本削减时,调整这一点很重要。其次,随着我们继续努力降低奥斯汀和柏林的成本(从第一季度到第二季度,我们做了很多工作),这些工厂仍然略高于其他地方的Model Y的生产成本。在本季度,我们与奥斯汀和柏林相关的建筑组合有所增加。因此,在建模影响时,这是需要考虑的问题,即从第一季度到第二季度,以每单位COGS计算。
我确实想问 Karn 在大宗商品方面还有其他问题或者更笼统地说,你想在这里补充一点?
Karn Budhiraj
是的。正如你所提到的,扎克,由于我们签订了长期合同,我们自然会有点偏离锂头寸。但是我们已经看到,所有专门用于电池(例如镍、钴和石墨)的大宗商品的定价全面降低。从每辆车的撞击来看,价格的降低可以转化为数千美元。我们正在利用历史最低的大宗商品定价,我当然要求将其中一些固定价格合约延长到本世纪末。因此,在展望未来时,我们将继续回顾这本剧本。
Martin Viecha
谢谢。关于FSD的下一个问题。你有没有考虑过允许FSD转让作为杠杆,让现有客户升级到新的特斯拉,而不是因为FSD的价格而被锁在现有汽车里?
埃隆马斯克
是的。这是我们经常被问到的问题。因此,我们很高兴地宣布,在第三季度,我们将允许FSD的转让。这是一次性的大赦。因此,必须如此 —— 你需要在第三季度利用它,但是 —— 或者至少在第三季度在合理的交货时间范围内下订单。所以是的,我希望这能让人们开心。这是一次性的事情。
Martin Viecha
对。下一个问题,我们何时会提供有关Cybertruck订单、预计交货时间表、定价和规格的更多信息?
埃隆马斯克
需求太远了,你甚至看不见钩子。所以,这真的不是问题。我确实想强调的是,Cybertruck里面有很多新技术,比如很多。它看起来不像 —— 它看起来不像任何其他车辆,因为它不像任何其他车辆。因此,产量增长的速度将与整个供应链和内部生产中最慢、最不可能的要素一样快。所以,我没想到 —— 我希望一切顺利。当然,我们在产量提升方面更胜一筹 —— 我们在生产坡道方面有丰富的经验。但是一阶近似值,Cybertruck 中大约有 10,000 个独特的零件和工艺。而且,如果有的话 —— 它的运行速度将与 10,000 个元素中最不幸运、执行效果最差的元素一样快。因此,最初总是很难预测坡道,但我认为明年我们将大量生产这些坡道,而且我们将在今年交付这辆车。
Martin Viecha
谢谢。下一个问题是,对Gigacasting的批评者认为,该过程使车辆更难维修,成本更高,这本质上是将成本推高给了客户。你能分享一些关于Gigacast车辆初始维修体验的细节吗?
埃隆马斯克
这一定是每个人都在模仿我们的原因。
Lars Moravy
谢谢,埃隆。这是拉尔斯。我的意思是,这简直不是真的。有一种误解,认为传统车身易于维修,但它们由多种材料和多种连接方法组成。必须钻出点焊缝和铆钉。必须将面板和结构粘合剂凿出来。必须去除干燥的粘合剂,污渍,切开,等等,等等,等等。
埃隆马斯克
这是一块疯狂的拼接被子。
Lars Moravy
是的。因此,把它们重新组合起来意味着时间和金钱。举一个替换 Model Y 中的后铸导轨的例子,要做到这一点,而不是像我们从 Model 3 中取代它的那样,使用铸轨更便宜 10 倍,快 3 倍。设计团队与我们的碰撞修复团队合作,因为我们对此有保险,我们设计的特定零件可以更轻松、更快地进行维修。而且我们有动力这样做,因为我们有自己的保险和自己的车身修理厂。我们预计我们会继续这样做,随着时间的推移,碰撞修复将继续变得更便宜、更快。而且我们已经将其提供给所有车身修理厂或特斯拉批准的车身修理厂培训。
埃隆马斯克
是的,在碰撞修复方面闭环并将其考虑在设计中是一件大事。
Lars Moravy
关键。我认为没有其他人能用我们拥有的生态系统做到,所以。
埃隆马斯克
是的。而且我们实际上能够用嵌件改变铸件的细节,而且我们实际上一直都这样做,所以 —— 因为嵌件实际上已经磨损了,无论如何都需要更换。因此,我们实际上可以对嵌件进行设计更改并调整铸件。但是铸造——基本上是铸造的后车身或前车身更轻、更便宜、噪音更好、振动更好、更刺耳,更容易制造。各方面都更好。这就是为什么这么多其他汽车公司都在效仿我们的原因。
Lars Moravy
可能吧。
埃隆马斯克
好吧,他们肯定发布了很多关于它的新闻稿。我认为未来所有汽车基本上都是这样制造的。
Martin Viecha
谢谢。下一个问题,已经制造了多少擎天柱机器人?他们什么时候才能开始执行有用的任务?
埃隆马斯克
我想我们大约有 5 或 6 个机器人。我想 —— 我想是 10 台。取决于什么 —— 有多少人在起作用以及处于哪个阶段。但有点像 —— 是的,每个月都有更多。Optimus 机器人有很多有趣的地方。我们发现实际上没有供应商可以生产执行器。无论如何,没有现成的执行器可以很好地适用于仿人机器人。
身份不明的公司代表
当然不引人注目。
埃隆马斯克
是的。没有人形机器人能做点什么 —— 人类能做的事情。因此,我们实际上必须设计自己的执行器来集成电机或电力电子设备、控制器和传感器。实际上,它们中的每一个都是定制设计的。然后,当然,我们将使用与汽车相同的推理硬件。但是,在设计这些执行器时,我们是为批量生产而设计的。因此,它们不仅比世界上任何其他执行器都更轻、更紧凑、更强大,而且实际上也是可以制造的。因此,我们应该能够批量制作它们。
第一个 Optimus 将配备特斯拉设计的所有执行器,集成了某种量产候选执行器,行走应该在 11 月左右。然后,我们将在那之后开始加大力度。就我们何时能够做一些有用的事情而言,比如我们将首先在自己的工厂里试一试这个然后证明它的用处,但我想明年某个时候我们就能让它在我们的工厂里做一些有用的事情。我会的 —— 是的,我对此很有信心。所以是的,进展顺利。
我应该说 Optimus 的另一件很酷的事情是 —— 仅在美国,就有 200 万被截肢者。我刚才在和 Neuralink 团队谈话。而且,通过将Neuralink植入物与机械臂或腿部或腿部截肢的人相结合,我们相信我们基本上可以提供一个能力令人难以置信的网络身体,这听起来令人印象深刻,但实际上 —— 所以我认为,如果能帮助世界各地的人们,给他们一只机器人手臂或者类似的机器手臂一样好,也许从长远来看可能比生物武器好,真是太不可思议了。
Martin Viecha
谢谢。下一个问题是,第二季度的订单量相对于产量水平的趋势如何?以及在本季度迄今为止的趋势如何?从概念上讲,特斯拉如何决定何时应该降低价格或采取其他销售激励措施来增加需求?
埃隆马斯克
是的。我猜,需求大致追踪了产量。因此,我们的目标是,我们真正拥有的东西 —— 我想没有其他汽车制造商能做到 —— 那就是我们有实时需求和实时生产,就像每周七天一样。我收到一封电子邮件 —— 订单生成的电子邮件,选择了来自全球所有工厂和订单的输出。因此,它基本上就像实时触摸地球脉冲一样。而且我们会根据公众的情绪调整方向。
对于绝大多数人来说,购买新车是一个重大决定。因此,每当出现经济不确定性时,人们通常会停下来购买新车,至少看看会发生什么。显然,另一个挑战是利率环境。随着利率的上升,用债务购买的任何东西的负担能力都会降低,因此实际上提高了汽车的价格。
因此,当利率急剧上升时,我们实际上必须降低汽车的价格,因为利息支付会增加汽车的价格。这是 —— 我相信,至少直到最近,这是历史上最大的一次加息。所以,我们必须为此做点什么。如果有人为全球经济准备了水晶球,如果我能借用那个水晶球,我真的很感激。
身份不明的公司代表
给我们发短信。
埃隆马斯克
是的,没错,给我发短信。它不应该在 Twitter 上。所以,我的意思是,有一天,世界经济似乎正在分崩离析,第二天,一切都很好。我不知道发生了什么。完全没问题。我希望我做到了。所以,我的意思是这就是为什么我像在 Twitter 上一样说,我发帖就像在真正提供建议一样,因为我非常关心那种小股东,尤其是那些在艰难时期一直待在我们身边的股东。我爱你,伙计们。因此,我们无法控制这些宏观冲击或股市的主题抑制性质。因此,这就是为什么我建议在动荡时期不要使用保证金贷款。如果时代没有那么动荡,那么实际上保证金贷款在合理范围内可能是明智之举。但我称之为我们正处在动荡的时代。就像我对特斯拉的长期价值非常有信心一样。就像我所看到的那样 —— 我真的看到了通往 10 倍的道路 —— 称之为公司价值增长 5 倍,可能是 10 倍。而且 —— 但是前进的方向、考验和磨难以及市场的情绪,人们无法预测。因此,买入并持有的古老格言是对的。对于投资建议,我想说的是将一家公司确定为你喜欢的产品。看看他们是否 —— 看来他们会继续生产好产品还是很棒的产品?买入那只股票并持有。仅此而已。你会赢的。
公司存在的原因是制造商品和服务,最好是优质的商品和服务。它们不存在是出于任何其他原因。他们不应该。所以,这就是为什么你应该购买一家生产优质产品且未来渠道良好的公司的股票。其实这是常识。
然后一般来说,如果你看见—— 如果你对公司的产品或服务有信心,当市场恐慌时,买入;当市场过于繁荣时,你可以卖出。我不是在向特斯拉推荐你,但是是的,低价买入,高价卖出。
实际上,我想沃伦·巴菲特有句谚语 —— 我在解释他的话,但是一家上市公司就像想象一下住在你的房子里,一个疯狂的躁狂抑郁症患者走来站在你家门外对你大喊房地产价格,而且价格每天都不一样。但是房子还是同一个房子。所以,这是一个股票市场。这要归功于沃伦·巴菲特。
Martin Viecha
谢谢。让我们来看下一个问题。由于强调降价以推动销量增长吞噬了汽车毛利率,投资者能否期望看到汽车毛利率因效率超过降幅而稳定甚至上升?如果是这样,什么时候?
埃隆马斯克
再说一遍,那个水晶球在哪里?如果可以的话,你看,与长期情况相比,毛利率和盈利能力的短期差异确实很小。自主权会让所有这些数字看起来很愚蠢。我建议你看看 ARK Invest。我认为他们的分析非常好。这是最好的。通常,Fintwit或财务、Twitter上的Smart Finance人士会关注他们的账户。它们很棒。所以在我看来,这是你能得到最好的信息的地方。因此,我坚信特斯拉是一项巨大的长期投资。而且,当事情起伏不定时,不要流汗。实际上,如果市场恐慌,那就买入;如果市场有点过于活跃,那就卖出。但总的来说,我相信我们会长期交付,但无法控制短期内交付。所以 —— 自主权才是真正的用武之地。我的意思是,扎卡里?
扎卡里·柯克霍恩
我完全同意你的看法。我的意思是,我认为短期内唯一重要的是我在开幕词中所说的话,那就是我们筹集了足够的资金来继续投资。而且,技术团队目前正在投资的产品和技术组合非常激烈。就投资而言,它非常激烈;就潜力而言,它非常激烈。
埃隆马斯克
坦率地说,我认为我们在资本密集型业务中拥有正的自由现金流,同时在新技术上投入了大量资金,这太荒谬了。那太难了。
身份不明的公司代表
还有垂直整合。它甚至不只是像新产品一样,而且...
埃隆马斯克
是的。实际上,我们分享了自己的份额...
扎卡里·柯克霍恩
因此,至少从我的角度来看,重要的是继续产生用于投资的现金。这意味着要继续高度关注短期成本的降低。我们在短期内降低成本所做的一切是否都为再投资提供了资金?我们非常注重营运资金管理,我们在原材料方面取得了相当大的进展,其中我们也非常关注应收账款,以确保我们能够继续将现金再投资。这就是我们关注的焦点。所以,其中有一组是我们控制的。我们有削减成本的渠道。正如卡恩所说,我们现在在大宗商品领域遇到了利好因素,这很有帮助。
平均销售价格的波动可以追溯到埃隆的观点。我们无法控制利率。我们无法控制宏观消费者情绪。但是我们有义务对此做出回应,以确保我们的供需相匹配并保持平衡。因此,这就是我们管理接下来的几个季度的方式。很快,这些宿舍就会过去。它们不会成为企业未来现金流现值的一部分。因此,我们希望确保我们保持这种观点,并确保长期业务完全符合我们想要的样子。
Martin Viecha
好吧。非常感谢。现在让我们来看看分析师的问题。第一个问题来自巴克莱银行的丹·利维。
丹·利维
我想先问一个关于你在 AI 和 Dojo 方面的努力的问题。很明显,听起来你在加快注意力。你能否让我们了解一下提炼产品的过程?是更多的机器吗?也许你可以让我们了解一下支出何时开始 —— 当你开始看到支出以及资源支出是多少,由此我们在 OpEx 方面应该期待什么?
埃隆马斯克
对不起。你是说我们要花多少钱在 Dojo 上还是...?
丹·利维
是的。
埃隆马斯克
在 Dojo 上进行研发?
丹·利维
是的。
埃隆马斯克
好吧,我们不会对我们的 Dojo 支出持开放态度。所以 —— 但我的意思是,我认为明年我们将花费超过10亿美元 —— 到明年,Dojo的支出将远远超过10亿美元。是的,所以我的意思是我们有大量的视频数据需要训练。这是另一回事—— 为了模仿我们,你还需要在训练计算上花费数十亿美元。我的意思是,就像 —— 而且也很难 —— 你需要数据,你需要训练计算机。就像 —— 想想,好吧,要真正实现这一目标,实现自治的通用解决方案,需要一些东西,确实如此 —— 这是有史以来最高的问题之一。
你会看到很多人工智能公司都在攻读法学硕士之类的。我想说的是,如果他们这么棒,为什么他们不能制造自动驾驶汽车?因为更难。这就是为什么。所以 —— 但我确实认为 —— 我认为有一些很棒的人工智能公司。但从根本上讲,我们必须处理的大量数据,必须以某种方式进行处理。而定制硅片是做到这一点的最佳方法。
因此,Dojo 的设计目的就是针对视频训练进行优化。它没有针对 LLM 进行优化。它针对视频训练进行了优化。通过视频训练,你的计算与内存带宽的比率要高得多,所以,而 LLM 往往会占用内存带宽。原来如此。我的意思是 —— 但就像我说的那样,我们也是 —— 我们有一些 —— 我们正在使用很多 NVIDIA 硬件。我们会继续 —— 实际上,我们会像 NVIDIA 向我们交付一样快地获得 NVIDIA 硬件。非常尊重 Jensen 和 NVIDIA。他们做得非常出色。
坦率地说,我不知道他们能否为我们提供足够的 GPU,我们可能不需要 Dojo,但他们不能。所以他们有这么多客户。尽管如此,他们还是很友善地优先考虑了我们的一些 GPU 订单。但是,是的,视频训练的规模之大 —— 因为就像我说的那样,我们不是想变得像人类一样出色。我们希望比人类好 10 倍,可能比人类好 100 倍。
现在,我相信每年大约有100万汽车死亡。然后,如果你说永久性重伤,我认为每年可能接近1000万人。而且 —— 因此,如果你是人类的两倍,那很重要,比人类好 10 倍 —— 比人类好 10 倍仍然意味着有 100,000 人死亡,100 万人严重永久性伤害。所以,就像,好吧,我们宁愿好一百倍。所以确实如此 —— 这是一场 9 秒的行军,我们希望实现尽可能完美的安全。而这确实是实现这一目标所需的视频和计算机数量令人难以置信。然后,我确实认为 Dojo 还有其他应用程序,但我们迫切需要它来进行视频训练。
扎卡里·柯克霍恩
再补充一下埃隆提到的内容。因此,他提到的数字介于研发支出和资本支出之间。而且进展很快。因此,我们提供了为期三年的资本支出展望。我们正在从这个角度考虑这些开支。随着这种情况向上和向下移动,我们将继续在 Q 中更新我们的指导方针
埃隆马斯克
是的。我想说,限制全自动驾驶进展的基本速率限制因素是训练。也就是说,如果我们有更多的训练计算,我们就能更快地完成它。原来如此。
扎卡里·柯克霍恩
而且很难预测我们能以多快的速度执行它。
丹·利维
太棒了。谢谢。作为后续行动,我意识到目前存在令人难以置信的宏观不确定性,但你坚持短期目标,即复合年增长率为50%的交易量目标。正如我们刚才想到的那样,在未来的一年里,Cybertruck将做出一些贡献。电动汽车普及率的进一步增长将带来一些帮助。但是,为了保持50%的交易量复合年增长率不变,你愿意在多大程度上牺牲定价,还是你对利润率的看法与之前关于愿意牺牲利润以获得更多份额的评论有所不同?
埃隆马斯克
这不是要获得更多份额。只是你可以把我们销售或生产的每辆具有完全自动驾驶能力的汽车看作是将来的价值可能高达今天的5倍。因为平均而言 —— 车辆每周行驶大约 10 个小时。如果有点像 —— 如果这表示平均每天1.5个小时,那就是每周10个小时。如果你开启了自动驾驶——如果车辆能够自动驾驶并使用专用自动驾驶或像Airbnb这样的部分自动驾驶,比如有时候你可能允许其他人使用你的汽车。有时候你想像爱彼迎一样独家使用它——在家里有房间的Airbnb。其价值实在是太大了。
所以,我认为有点像 —— 我认为确实如此 —— 为了制造更多汽车而牺牲利润确实是有意义的,因为我们认为,在不久的将来,它们的估值将大幅提高。我认为,在我们可以上传完全自动驾驶并获得监管机构批准时,特斯拉车队的价值上涨将是资产价值历史上最大的单一变化。
Martin Viecha
谢谢。我们去找下一位分析师吧。这个问题来自德意志银行的伊曼纽尔·罗斯纳。
伊曼纽尔·罗斯纳
我还有两个问题。首先,跟进自主权。因此,在开始在现有车辆上推出这些专用的robotaxi车辆之前,您需要逐步提高FSD。你最新的目标时机是何时发布非测试版或会触发更高接受率的令人眼花缭乱的版本?特斯拉会从降低FSD的价格中受益吗?
埃隆马斯克
好吧,很明显,由于人们有点取笑我,也许相当公平地取笑了我,所以我过去对实现完全自动驾驶的预测一直是乐观的。我之所以持乐观态度,是因为——看起来好像是—— 我们将在推出新版本的 FSD 方面取得快速进展,但随后它会以对数方式曲线。所以首先,对数曲线看起来像一条相当直的向上线,对角线向上。所以,如果你推断出来,那么你就有好事了。但是由于它实际上是对数的,所以它会弯曲过来,然后出现了一系列堆叠的对数曲线。
现在,我是那个哭了 FSD 的男孩,但我想到今年年底我们会比人类更好。这并不是说我们得到了监管机构的批准。我的意思是在美国,因为我们必须先专注于一个市场。但我认为,到今年年底,我们会比人类更好。过去我错了,这次我可能错了。
而且 FSD 的价格——所以很棒的是 FSD 的价格实际上很低,并不高。当你回到我之前所说的话时,如果这辆车实际上是自动驾驶的,它的价值就会大大增加。15,000美元实际上是一个低价格,而不是一个高价格。而且我们会提供 —— 而且我们 —— 我认为我们确实以月度订阅的形式提供 FSD,尽管大多数人都不知道。所以,我建议你尝试一下按月订阅的方式,这样你就不必选择 15,000 美元的东西了。但我认为,是的,是的 —— 显然,如果这辆车的价值是原价的几倍,那么对于FSD来说,15,000美元实际上是一个低廉的价格。
Martin Viecha
下一个问题来自 Truist 的 William Stein。
威廉·斯坦
我想问一下 —— 继续谈这个人工智能话题。我们饶有兴趣地阅读了 Dojo 今天的进展,你谈过了 FSD,但你也有 —— Elon,你创办了这家 x.ai 公司。对于那些认为特斯拉的人工智能功能和产品可能具有相当大价值的投资者来说,看到你以人工智能为重点的另一项努力可能会令人担忧。那么,你能否谈谈 x.ai 会如何重叠,可能与特斯拉竞争,或者以其他方式竞争,也许它会提高特斯拉所做工作的价值?
埃隆马斯克
是的。我认为这实际上会提高特斯拉的价值。世界上只有一些最优秀的人工智能工程师和科学家愿意加入一家初创公司,但他们不愿意加入像特斯拉这样相对成熟的大型公司。所以,就像—— 它实际上就是这样开始的。我在采访几个人,他们说,不,我们想做一家初创公司。我当时想,没关系 —— 我无法说服他们加入特斯拉。所以 —— 所以,好吧,好吧,我开始跑步比去其他地方工作要好。这就是 xAi 的起源。
而且 xAi 专注于 AGI。是的。就是这样 —— 就像我说的那样,我认为 xAi 会为特斯拉带来一些价值。还有一些最优秀的人 —— 对于世界上最优秀的人来说,他们真的只想解决有趣的问题。因此,比如说,如果你选择一个材料科学小组,那么真正说服查理·科尔曼离开苹果的原因是他得同时在特斯拉和SpaceX工作,在那里他非常高兴,报酬丰厚,而且在这两者中,我们都认为这是世界上最好的材料科学小组。如果只有特斯拉,他不愿意离开苹果,但如果是特斯拉和SpaceX,他愿意这样做。因此,如果这是你需要做的事情,有时候你会得到世界上最好的人才。这实际上对特斯拉非常有利。
威廉·斯坦
如果我能再问一个平凡的问题。我想知道你是否认为按照目前的定价可以达到180万辆的数量,还是你预计需要继续降低价格,因为价格似乎已经稳定下来。在过去的1.5个月中,趋势已经稳定下来。我们应该指望在今年余下的时间里会持续下降还是进一步稳定?
埃隆马斯克
当然。我们有点 —— 我们启动了推荐计划,我认为这将非常有效。正如扎克早些时候所说,我们无法控制宏观经济状况。因此,如果利率继续上升,汽车的负担能力就会降低。对于很多人来说,他们确实如此 —— 他们每个月都在实现收支平衡。实际上,如果你看一下信用卡债务的增加,它们实际上并不是每个月都实现收支平衡。信用卡债务看起来很可怕。所以,我们只是无法控制市场状况。如果市场状况稳定,我认为价格将稳定。如果它们不稳定,那么我们的价格就会降低。是的。
Martin Viecha
谢谢。我们去找奥本海默的 Colin Rusch 吧。
科林·拉什
当你正在构建 Dojo 并实现真正高度复杂的软件集时,你能否谈谈操作系统的成熟度以及你期望在该系统中使用多少外包软件?
埃隆马斯克
这是一个自定义软件堆栈,所以。但是它的设计是为了让你可以在高级水平上运行,PyTorch 和 JAX。但是接下来我们必须对其进行自定义才能在自定义芯片上运行。因此,软件堆栈是开源软件和特斯拉软件的组合,一直到裸露的芯片,汽车中的推理计算机就是这种情况。
科林·拉什
好吧。非常感谢。这非常有用。然后你能谈谈你是如何管理与产能扩张有关的一些地缘政治风险吗?显然,随着你们继续以这种速度增长,你会让一些人倒闭。而且还会对区域经济产生一些影响。所以,我只想了解你在一些资本支出计划方面是如何看待这个问题的,以及你是如何管理与不同国家和地区的一些关系的。
埃隆马斯克
好吧,这是一个地缘政治风险异常的时期。所以,我认为我们是 —— 我们能做的最好的事情就是在世界许多地方建立工厂,这样如果世界某个地方的情况变得困难,我们仍然可以让世界其他地方的事情继续发展。
Martin Viecha
谢谢。下一个问题来自高盛的马克·德莱尼。
马克·德莱尼
特斯拉在降低成本方面取得了进展,上个季度又取得了进展。你能否提供最新情况,说明你认为每辆车的汽车 COGS 何时可能低于每辆车 36,000 美元的历史水平?而实现这一目标的关键看跌期权和期权是什么?
扎卡里·柯克霍恩
这是 —— 我想过去有人问过这个问题。这很难预测。有一系列成本由我们管理,一系列成本是我们无法控制的。因此,特别是在大宗商品方面,劳动力成本的去向等等,很难说。
埃隆马斯克
是的。而且我们看到了非常严重的通货膨胀——比如去年一段时间的强劲通货膨胀压力。现在——这显然使得减少COGS变得非常困难。现在我们看到了看似通缩的压力,当然是通货紧缩的压力 —— 通缩不是压力。但是,正如前面提到的那样,我们看到大宗商品价格下跌,正如卡恩刚才提到的那样。我的意思是,我不知道,你怎么看?我的意思是,基本上,大宗商品层面的趋势似乎是通货紧缩的。
Karn Budhiraj
绝对是。就是这样。此外,随着销量的增长,单位经济性也有所改善。这是我们看到的另一件事。随着我们成为许多供应商中更大、更好的组成部分,规模经济开始发挥作用。有设备折旧在起作用,这些设备是在5到7年前投入使用的。这曾经是计件价格的一部分。这已经完全摊销了。因此,我们将看到由于设备贡献已经消失而导致单件价格下降的情况。
然后,我们继续保持这种心态,那就是在劳动力、减少劳动力、提高自动化方面持续改进,然后继续做得更好。所以我们已经看到 —— 我想每个季度,我们都会看到改善。当然,大宗商品涨跌互现。总的来说,趋势是提高效率。
扎卡里·柯克霍恩
是的,我完全同意。
埃隆马斯克
是的,有一段时间以来,那里的锂价格简直太疯狂了。
扎卡里·柯克霍恩
是的。而且他们现在正在康复。
Karn Budhiraj
钴——过去的样子。
扎卡里·柯克霍恩
是的。而且我们还处于坡道的初期 —— 好吧,不是坡道的早期,而是在奥斯汀和柏林的成本下降曲线的早期。因此,计算成本需要时间。首先,它专注于坡道 —— 坡道,它可以降低成本...
埃隆马斯克
还有质量成本...
扎卡里·柯克霍恩
是的。然后,一旦稳定下来,我们就可以将带宽转移到降低成本上。因此,从第一季度到第二季度,奥斯汀和柏林的成本大幅降低。我们将继续开展这项工作,这将有所帮助。所以我们要继续努力解决这个问题。
身份不明的公司代表
包装是其中的一个重要元素。
埃隆马斯克
是的,物流...
扎卡里·柯克霍恩
物流正在正常化,这太棒了。
身份不明的公司代表
[难以辨认] 利用率,这是团队一直非常关注的问题。所以,其中的每一点。
扎卡里·柯克霍恩
是的,而且很难...
埃隆马斯克
物流被低估了。是的,所以说话就像阀门一样,战术与后勤合而为一。
身份不明的公司代表
是的。而且,在过期成本方面,我们在各个方面都取得了巨大的成本改善。我们现在已经达到了疫情前的过期成本水平,我们的目标是进一步降低。
扎卡里·柯克霍恩
是的。因此,当我们审视从第一季度到第二季度在成本方面的进展时,从内部的角度来看,根据混音转移的影响进行标准化,奥斯汀和柏林在我们的组合中所占的比例更高,第二季度S和X的标准化比例高于第一季度的连续成本降低,这可能是我们一段时间以来最大的一次。所以,我认为代表特斯拉团队做得很好,我们只需要继续努力。
埃隆马斯克
是的,这是一场几分钱的游戏。这是一部有几分钱的《权力的游戏》。
Martin Viecha
马克,你还有后续问题吗?我想你已经沉默了。
马克·德莱尼
是的。非常感谢您提供有关此的所有详细信息。也许你可以更详细地说明你在准备好的评论中谈到的停机时间对生产的影响,然后还有你计划在本季度进行的工厂升级对利润率的影响程度?
扎卡里·柯克霍恩
是的。停机时间 —— 我们不知道受影响的汽车的确切数量,因为我们进入停机时间窗口进行升级的方式是留出一段时间,但随后团队面临着尽快启动的挑战,这样我们才能让工厂恢复运转并最大限度地减少这种情况。这不是深刻的还原。希望它很小。
埃隆马斯克
我想我们在这里陷入困境太多了。我的意思是,就像我们要求的精确度是无法回答的。所以,让我们继续前进。
Martin Viecha
是的。我想不幸的是,这是我们今天的全部时间。所以,我们将在接下来的三个月里和大家谈谈。非常感谢。
埃隆马斯克
谢谢。
(提示:此笔录是通过录音转换的,我们会尽力而为,但不能完全保证转换的准确性,仅供参考。)