Pros & Cons of Tesla Supercharging Changes

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As you’ve certainly heard, Tesla has laid off 500 workers within the Supercharging division, the vast majority of its Supercharger staff. Upon the sudden information, varied causes have been put forth for why Elon Musk might need laid all of them off. Reportedly, the core motive was that at a time when Musk needed the heads of Tesla’s totally different enterprise divisions to maintain no quite a lot of important workers and lay off the remaining, Rebecca Tinucci, head of the Supercharger division, argued with him about that and didn’t lay off sufficient workers in her division. So, she was fired and 500 Supercharger workers have been instantly laid off to point out what occurs once you dissent in an organization that … encourages discourse, freedom of speech, and questioning the chief?

Anyway, in response to all of the confusion and dialogue across the subject, Musk offered the next replace:

General, like many others, I discover this choice to be a bit wild, surprising, and regarding. Although, there are professionals in addition to cons. I needed to run down an inventory of those as I see them.

Cons?

To begin off, right here’s a remark from a reader: “(T)the rest of the auto industry is reeling and even talking about rolling back their NACS commitments. The Supercharger network is Tesla’s biggest competitive advantage, and knee-capping it just as it is about to become the defacto charging network for the whole country is insane.”

Another reader states: “With hundreds of millions in NEVI money on the table for chargers, with the most reliable and cost effective chargers, with your fired guy negotiating contracts with all the major and minor makers for adoption, a slowdown right now is, uh, like 4 dimensional chess dude.”

Right here’s my listing:

• The Supercharger community has lengthy been a important aggressive benefit for the corporate (our unique analysis surveying hundreds of EV house owners for years has proven this, however so does widespread sense at this level). The community drives gross sales attributable to its breadth, reliability, and ease of use. Stalling its progress will not be going to assist shopper demand. Even simply from a PR perspective, this hurts the Tesla model.
• Most automakers have now jumped in with Tesla on Supercharging, however, for essentially the most half, the partnerships are hardly off the bottom. Saying now “meh, we’re not going to expand as much as we have been” should present a bit of little bit of concern, and contemplating most of those automakers haven’t really gotten EVs made but to naturally hook up with Superchargers, who is aware of if some is perhaps tempted to alter course? Why does it matter? Frankly, Tesla can alter pricing on Superchargers to make this a notable revenue middle, and it shouldn’t be leaving an enormous opening for the competitors to come back in and compete with the community Tesla’s been constructing out. As one other reader, Matt Fulkerson, says superbly“Note that Tesla, if Elon would only embrace it!, has a near monopoly on reliable fast charging in North America. And can suck up costumers from other manufacturers. That Elon is now forgoing this, after making deals regarding NACS, only shows his instability.” It’s arduous to even think about arguments to that.
• There are nonetheless numerous gaps within the community. There are nonetheless numerous locations the place it might be handy and useful to have Superchargers. Now, the staff of a whole lot of people that have been doing so nicely at filling these gaps appears to have been indiscriminately hacked off.
• General, it simply looks as if a spiteful, reactionary, determined transfer from a dictatorial CEO. It doesn’t appear useful for worker morale (together with supervisor morale and motivation) or the corporate’s repute.

Professionals?

To begin off this part, that is an fascinating one from a reader, Troy Frank: “Tesla’s charge plug (NACS) is now the standard. Tesla has started letting others use their plug/stations. Why would they continue spending a lot of resources making things better for their competitors. Better to make the rest of the industry foot more of the bill for future expansion of chargers. Tesla has already spent a ton over the last 10+ years on this.”

• As Troy says, Tesla has invested a ton into this community, and now that others can mainly set up Superchargers with totally different branding however the identical {hardware}, why not allow them to choose up the shovel and do the work? (One counterpoint to this, although, is that it received’t assure the identical stage of software program, comfort, upkeep, or reliability. Additionally, as famous above, it takes away a possible revenue supply.)
• I do really suppose it’s extra necessary for Tesla so as to add stalls at present stations and guarantee uptime as prime priorities. I’ve pushed to Orlando a number of instances with my Tesla, and there are tons of Supercharger stations there, however they usually don’t have numerous stalls, so it’s a must to form of guess which station will make sure you have open stalls. I’ve needed to briefly wait at stations there. You probably have 40 stalls at a station as a substitute of 10, you would be fairly certain that’s the place you’re going to cease and never be messing round checking stations and availability whereas driving. (That stated, including stalls isn’t all the time potential. There are a lot of circumstances the place stations are maxed out by way of both parking availability or energy capability.)
• Possibly there was some bloat within the Supercharging division and it wanted to be cleared out and made extra environment friendly. (Although, the way in which this reportedly occurred makes it sound extra like a reckless mass sacking than a surgical transfer.)
• As I reported lately (only one week in the past), Tesla Supercharger stations were still growing strong in Q1. In truth, within the face of gross sales decline, there was an enormous mismatch. The variety of Tesla Supercharger stations rose 26% from Q1 2023 to Q1 2024, and the variety of Tesla Supercharger connectors rose 27% from Q1 2023 to Q1 2024. I even famous on the time that I used to be skeptical we’d see such progress within the subsequent quarter contemplating all the value reducing Tesla was doing. Right here’s what I wrote: “Frankly, percentage-wise, Tesla’s vehicle fleet did not grow nearly as much as the number of Superchargers, service vehicles, and Tesla locations did. So, that’s a great sign for anyone concerned about ongoing Supercharger and service availability. What will happen in this quarter (Q2) with Tesla cutting costs so dramatically? Will Supercharger growth, service fleet growth, and location growth all come to a halt as well? Will they plow on as they have been? Something in between?” I believe we acquired our reply.

I will even observe that I believe Elon Musk will change course on the Supercharger plans once more sooner or later as Tesla’s money movement will get in higher order (assuming it does get in higher order). It’s form of like what occurred a number of years in the past when Tesla bumped into monetary bother and stated it was closing all of its shops … earlier than shortly altering course and rising shops once more. That appeared additional nuts, whereas this simply appears semi nuts, and so long as gross sales, income, & revenue progress return, I think about Supercharger station progress will return. That stated, I don’t know what number of of these ~500 laid off employees come again to assist, and I’m unsure effectively and successfully the corporate will get again on observe with all of that have gone.

General, I believe this transformation is a case of “cutting off one’s nose to spite their face.” I do see some positives, nevertheless it feels extra like a determined transfer that smashes Tesla’s picture, shopper demand, and rising partnerships than a nicely thought out and deliberate course change. We’ll must see how issues evolve now.