[HN Gopher] Nikola: How to Parlay an Ocean of Lies into a Partne...
___________________________________________________________________
Nikola: How to Parlay an Ocean of Lies into a Partnership with GM
Author : aripickar
Score : 192 points
Date : 2020-09-10 21:24 UTC (1 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (hindenburgresearch.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (hindenburgresearch.com)
| baltimore wrote:
| Why do I cringe when I see "at a high rate of speed" where "at
| high speed" should be?
| sneak wrote:
| Same reason I cringe when people use "as per" where a single
| "as" or "per" will do (per means as), "thusly" instead of
| "thus", and, my personal anti-favorite, "individual" to mean
| "person".
|
| It's a special kind of pretentious language that people use to
| make them seem more authoritative or accurate/deliberate. It's
| manipulative.
| sokoloff wrote:
| For me "leverage" instead of "use" is like nails on a
| chalkboard.
| dnautics wrote:
| - usage instead of "use" (they _are_ different words)
|
| - quantify/fication instead of "measure/ment"
|
| - problematic instead of "a problem"
|
| - such that instead of "that" (the correct usage is as a
| phrase that comes from math proofs, "pick an x such that
| y")
| bonestamp2 wrote:
| It's the same for me when someone says, or writes, "as of late"
| instead of "lately". Sometimes people think that more words
| make their writing more professional, but it's usually the
| opposite. Sentences that are more polished and concise are the
| hallmark of professional writers.
| dugditches wrote:
| >On the morning of September 8, 2020, Nikola announced a
| strategic manufacturing partnership with General Motors, sending
| shares of both companies sharply higher.
|
| Interesting that GM seems to be making a lot of moves at once.
|
| https://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/03/gm-and-honda-to-estabish-str...
| thrill wrote:
| Hindenburg Research is a well known short seller.
| the-dude wrote:
| To be fair : they explicity state their position ( they are
| indeed short ) at the end of the article.
| guardiangod wrote:
| _Initial Disclosure: After extensive research, we have taken
| a short position in shares of Nikola Corp. This report
| represents our opinion, and we encourage every reader to do
| their own due diligence. Please see our full disclaimer at
| the bottom of the report._
|
| This is within 5 minutes of reading so I don't know where you
| got the 'end of the article' from.
|
| (I read the report this morning so they didn't added it after
| ward.)
| adrianmonk wrote:
| > _don 't know where you got the 'end of the article' from_
|
| They didn't say only at the end. Near the top, the article
| itself even says to look at the end: "Please see our full
| disclaimer at the bottom of the report."
| Someone wrote:
| It's before a zillion background addendums, so not quite at
| the end think but it would be fairer to do so a lot earlier.
|
| Reason? I think most readers would stop reading this (IMO)
| badly written and badly formatted avalanche of statements
| (which may or may not be true, but the form in which it is
| presented doesn't give me confidence that it is) before
| hitting that info.
| codys wrote:
| They also disclose immediately after the summary at the start
| (bullet points).
| CydeWeys wrote:
| And they're short selling this position because they have good
| reason to believe the stock price is severely overinflated due
| to fraud. If what they're saying is true (and they provide lots
| of evidence) then this company is basically worthless.
| thrill wrote:
| Short sellers take positions because they believe stocks are
| overvalued, at least in the short term, and at least can be
| made to look that way with sufficient negative marketing.
| When they share their market research with lots of
| adjectives, but oddly do not share any of the positives that
| a company may possess (and why would they?), then any
| investor acting on that one sided information has possibly
| done himself a significant financial disservice.
| Apocryphon wrote:
| Sure, and what are the positives specific to Nikola?
| thrill wrote:
| I hold no position in Nikola. Positives include them
| working in an area with potential large upsides,
| specifically trying to develop the use of Hydrogen where
| it's a good fit today, in long haul trucking. Future
| great places for it include shipping, sporadic power
| generation storage (wind and solar), etc. Batteries
| improve steadily, but so far nothing proven scalable and
| affordable doesn't involve significant amounts of limited
| lithium, meaning alternatives to battery systems are
| worth pursuing.
| guardiangod wrote:
| >oddly do not share any of the positives that a company may
| possess
|
| Oddly? It's not the job of the investors to champion for
| the company. The short seller presented a report with
| research and evidences. Another party is welcome to produce
| their own report that 'share any of the positives that a
| company may possess.' For example, Nikola.
|
| Let the company presents its side of the story, then it's
| up to the market/public to decide whether the reports stand
| on their own merit.
| Analemma_ wrote:
| Articles like this are exactly what short-selling is supposed
| to be for: encouraging people to do deep research and find
| overvalued stocks.
| beamatronic wrote:
| That's an awfully tasteless choice of a name then. They are
| looking for companies that are going to catch on fire, crash
| and burn?
| function_seven wrote:
| Huh. I actually didn't catch that until I read your comment.
| I think it's a great name.
|
| In any case, I think the "too soon?" window has closed for
| the Hindenburg Disaster.
| mediaman wrote:
| They're looking for companies that are fatally flawed but
| present otherwise. Kind of like the Hindenburg.
|
| Hedge funds are not usually terribly concerned with marketing
| image. See, for example, Cerberus Capital Management, the
| former owner of Chrysler, which saw fit to name itself after
| a three-headed dog that guards the gates of Hell.
| perl4ever wrote:
| As is sometimes noted, the Hindenburg is known as a gigantic
| disaster, but only a little over a third of the people on it
| died, which is probably better than you usually get from an
| airplane that explodes in a fireball at 600 feet.
|
| So maybe they are looking for companies that are going to
| have extreme PR disasters, regardless of actual consequences.
| ctvo wrote:
| I find the audacity of the fraud hilarious.
|
| They pulled a truck up a hill and let it roll down unpowered,
| using it in a video demonstrating their new EV technology when
| nothing worked. Who does that.
| swyx wrote:
| i dunno - here is the video in question:
| https://blurbsurfer.com/index.php/video/p9reimwb that really
| look like a hill to you?
| williamscales wrote:
| Yeah, that actually does look like a hill. It appears to me
| the road rises up to the ridge seen in the background.
| ojosilva wrote:
| Can anyone pinpoint the location? Then we could clear this
| up. Seems like relevant evidence on the whole scheme, if
| that's really the case.
| crisnoble wrote:
| The article has the exact location.
| williamscales wrote:
| The article authors did find the location and there is a
| 3% grade on the road: https://www.google.com/maps/@40.520
| 8858,-112.5008986,3a,75y,...
| revscat wrote:
| Read the article. It discusses how they tested with the same
| road, and were able to put an SUV in neutral and achieve a
| cruising speed of 53mph using that same road.
| swyx wrote:
| huh, TIL. guilty of scanning.
| recursive wrote:
| No, it doesn't look like a hill. But it doesn't matter what
| it looks like. They found the exact road, and it has a 3%
| grade.
| liability wrote:
| Honestly it does look like a hill for me, particularly in
| the shots where the road is angled down and to the left
| with the truck rolling left. I know that's partially an
| optical illusion and doesn't represent the true slope but I
| do think it _looks_ like a hill.
| perl4ever wrote:
| You can make a vehicle roll "uphill" if you choose the spot
| carefully.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravity_hill
| prdonahue wrote:
| Startups do this. All the time. But they're typically software
| not hardware demos so much easier to fake.
| foolfoolz wrote:
| this sounds equivalent to recording your demo of your website
| to play during a conference because you aren't sure it's
| gonna work on stage. done that plenty of times
| jariel wrote:
| Not equivalent though, by a stretch.
|
| That would be 'Tesla making a video of a working vehicle
| and showing it at Conf because they are not sure it will
| start!'
|
| There are reasonable expectations of 'show', but showing
| something that literally does not work, as 'working' would
| be fraud.
|
| The equivalent would be 'there is no software' so 'just
| make a video fabrication of software' and then show that at
| the conf.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| There is a pretty big gap between "it might crash so I have
| a backup" and "it has never worked so let's fake it".
| beamatronic wrote:
| Every start up ever
| winrid wrote:
| Fake it till you make it, to the extreme.
| femto113 wrote:
| I like how they carefully called this demo "in motion", not
| "driving" or even "road test". It's definitely in motion!
| coliveira wrote:
| This is the secret of the startup business.
| shajznnckfke wrote:
| I'm not big on trading individual stocks, but I own a bunch of
| long puts on Nikola. I don't know any other company that seems as
| likely to go to zero (other than companies like Hertz, where
| everyone knows so the options are priced appropriately).
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Be careful with those puts. It's entirely possible to be right
| and still not be able to close out your position because the
| underlying is halted/delisted.
| rohitb91 wrote:
| The market can stay irrational longer than you can stay
| solvent
|
| I think the flood of retail investors with disposable income
| and government benefits is leading to absurdities in market
| pricing. See: Hertz skyrocketing after announcing
| bankruptcies.
|
| After all, the stock has dropped 90%, how much lower can it
| go right?
|
| Well, to the new investors, all the way to 0.
| fossuser wrote:
| Yeah, I'm pretty confident Nikola is a total fraud that will go
| to zero but it's still hard to make money even knowing that.
|
| How long will the fraud last? Isn't your return limited by the
| difference available under the put?
|
| I generally stick to calls because it's way easier to make
| money in a company you know is good and it's easier to capture
| the upside (Peloton for me recently).
|
| Market seems skewed this way, it's a lot harder to correct the
| price even when you know it's total bullshit. Seems likely to
| allow frauds to go on longer.
| objektif wrote:
| How is Peloton a good company can you please explain?
| fossuser wrote:
| - Really good product (most important).
|
| - Subscription model makes sense and is sticky with good
| margins.
|
| - Undercuts gyms while providing better experience.
|
| - Well timed growth during pandemic.
|
| If I use a product and think it's really excellent I'll
| check out the stock and the company. This has largely
| worked for Apple, Tesla (bought in 2012), and now Peloton.
| antoniuschan99 wrote:
| Peloton is actually really good. I subscribe to their
| digital service for 12.99 a month and you get to access
| all the classes. Basically like online bootcamp/yoga. Not
| sure why the consensus overlooks this part and focuses on
| their expensive hardware (I don't have any of that).
| [deleted]
| jariel wrote:
| The fraud is not interesting.
|
| The fact that big companies and Big CEO's are stupid and
| incompetent is the interesting thing.
|
| Everyone who worked on this deal at GM should be fired along with
| the CEO.
|
| I once worked at a 'Big Company' that thought about buying n Mp3
| player. Everyone loved their CEO, their pitch, the box, product
| looked slick.
|
| We were going to buy it. I took it home and tried it and it was
| garbage.
|
| Literally our M&A team, execs, due diligence and _nobody bothered
| to f_ __ing try the dam product* and use a little bit of common
| sense to ascertain whether it was 'quality' or not.
|
| This was not fraud, and of a much smaller scale, but it's just
| incredible how big the 'blind spot' so many executives have.
|
| Edit: I said executives were 'stupid' they generally are not.
| They just have gaping holes in their abilities, that enough ego
| doesn't allow them to even see themselves. It's understandable
| they don't want to look weak, but insane that they don't do
| background/deep checks.
|
| If I were a CEO I would include 'product & IP validation' right
| up front as part of due diligence - not just by 'accredited
| people' (because you can't get a 'CA' in tech) but by people you
| trust.
|
| Edit 2:
|
| "Trevor has appointed his brother, Travis, as "Director of
| Hydrogen Production/Infrastructure" to oversee this critical part
| of the business. Travis's prior experience looks to have largely
| consisted of pouring concrete driveways and doing subcontractor
| work on home renovations in Hawaii."
|
| Oh please make this into a Tiger King Netflix special ...
| avolcano wrote:
| "Hindenburg Research" is already an excellent name for a short
| seller, but in this case, they are short selling a company
| creating cars powered by _hydrogen fuel cells_. 2020 continues to
| be an incredibly on-the-nose year.
| tempsy wrote:
| This interview from April 2019 was the thing that convinced me he
| was a fraud. https://www.truckinginfo.com/330475/whats-behind-
| the-grille-...
|
| This gem right here:
|
| > "The entire infotainment system is a HTML 5 super computer,"
| Milton said. "That's the standard language for computer
| programmers around the world, so using it let's us build our own
| chips. And HTML 5 is very secure. Every component is linked on
| the data network, all speaking the same language. It's not a
| bunch of separate systems that somehow still manage to
| communicate."
|
| This guy does not know what HTML is. What he has described is not
| what HTML would be used for.
|
| And I'm supposed to believe he's some sort of mastermind behind
| some new age hydrogen/electric truck?
| jamsiedaly wrote:
| The bigger issue here is that this man was able to convince
| "industry veterans" to give him massive amounts of money. You
| can see through him in a heart beat because you're technically
| savvy. Clearly the people running these automakers are not.
| [deleted]
| james412 wrote:
| You think he's a fraud simply because he bullshitted his way
| through some computer sales pitch? In a way, I have a ton of
| respect for people willing to even try this kind of thing in
| public
|
| If he could talk lucidly about things like HTML I'd think that
| lent more credence to the possibility he didn't have a clue
| about hydrogen
| tempsy wrote:
| it's the cherry on top of everything else he's bullshitted
| through.
|
| nothing about his background or experience gives any
| legitimacy to him being in a position of "electric truck CEO
| and mogul"
| ceejayoz wrote:
| You have a ton of respect for people who will lie through
| their teeth to make a sale?
|
| Why should we not assume his HTML5 knowledge is roughly
| equivalent to his hydrogen car knowledge?
| cj wrote:
| Fair enough. But what kind of person lies about the existence
| of solar panels on their roof?
|
| > Trevor claimed that Nikola's headquarters has 3.5 megawatts
| of solar panels on its roof producing energy. Aerial photos
| of the roof and later media reports show that the supposed
| panels don't exist.
| ineedasername wrote:
| I don't have respect for people that bullshit their way
| through situations that fraudulently entice investors to put
| their money into a company.
| jameslevy wrote:
| At least he's talking about the infotainment system, and not an
| internal system or something where there's no conceivable use
| for HTML/JS.
| tempsy wrote:
| > "so using it let's us build our own chips"
|
| what is the connection between HTML5 and building your own
| chips?
| ashtonkem wrote:
| Both are things that get non-tech savvy investors excited,
| apparently.
| tempsy wrote:
| "...I use CSS too!"
|
| _stock goes up 10%_
| WalterSear wrote:
| They are both Venture Capital-strength buzzwords.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| I wouldn't care if you're building an actual website, calling
| something "an HTML5 super computer" is total bullshit in any
| context.
| wyxuan wrote:
| They said that they would release a report on a well known
| company but this is a little disappointing. I think everyone knew
| that Nikola was pretty shady to begin with. After all, it's not
| everyday when the company sells merch that revolves around their
| trading symbol
| vsskanth wrote:
| So it seems GM didn't really give any money to Nikola ? The
| article mentions they get 2 billion equivalent in stocks for non-
| cash contributions and 700 million in reimbursements from Nikola.
| dzdt wrote:
| Does anyone have a contrary spurce of positive evidence that
| Nikola honestly does have valuable working technology? I have not
| made any effort to dig, but what little I had seen of Nikola so
| far seemed more hype than substance so the accusations here seem
| pretty believable.
| m3kw9 wrote:
| Check this one: " elaborate ruse--Nikola had the truck towed to
| the top of a hill on a remote stretch of road and simply filmed
| it rolling down the hill."
| clomond wrote:
| And the thread of the sweater gets pulled...
|
| While not shocking given the previous track record of Trevor's
| previous enterprises - the most likely outcome here is that it
| will get very, very ugly. He also already 'cashed out' millions
| of dollars to buy a 32.5 million dollar ranch - one of the
| largest residential properties in Utah's history. [1]
|
| Tesla's run up and general optimism around EVs seems to have
| triggered a gold rush of sorts, effecting other EV pureplays'
| stock prices (ex. NIO) regardless of progress and actual state of
| the technology.
|
| While in theory I am in strong support of new financing models to
| bring new technologies to market(ex. these Special Purpose
| Acquisition Companies - SPACs) I am very concerned that if even a
| portion of the alleged is true, this could poison this financing
| route for legitimate businesses and the sector overall. A camp in
| the investment industry even think Tesla is a fraud, and this
| would only harm the narrative and long term mission of Tesla.
|
| It would have been great if they actually took the money,
| utilized it with a plan and executed on the plan to help with
| electrification - the premise for which I think many retail
| investors have become involved.
|
| Even if there was no fraud, I was always skeptical of their plan
| (smelled like vaporware to me) and their adamance about hydrogen
| as an energy storage medium without sufficient discussion on
| electrolyzer technology or how those unit economics work always
| struck me as big red flags. Seems like Nikola's plan was to
| combine a bunch of off the shelf parts existing from other
| sources into a product, in that case - where is the technology?
| So much of it with just the bit of digging and what I hear about
| it has made me skeptical.
|
| Probably best to stay as far away as possible and see where the
| chips fall. I do wish them the best though, assuming there was no
| fraud.
|
| [1] https://www.latimes.com/business/real-
| estate/story/2019-11-1...
| yholio wrote:
| Combining existing off the shelf components into a novel design
| is a legitimate way to build an innovative product. The first
| Tesla Roadster was exactly that, all car companies had access
| to the technology but they dismissed it as a gimmick, who would
| buy a street car powered by lawn mower tech.
| dylan604 wrote:
| >A camp in the investment industry even think Tesla is a fraud,
|
| At this point in Tesla's history, how is it a fraud? It is
| manufacturing and selling cars. It is building batteries. I can
| see where some may think it is not living up to the
| hype/promise of returns, but they are actually making and
| selling product. Yet people are still claiming fraud?
| LegitShady wrote:
| There are a lot of short sellers who lost money who were
| desperate for any reason for Tesla stock to fall.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| This is an incredibly unfair characterization about how
| short sellers think and operate.
| [deleted]
| clomond wrote:
| Couldn't agree more that the sentiment doesn't make sense
| given what they have actually done, all of their proof, all
| their products, patents etc. (disclaimer: I'm long TSLA)
|
| I'm just relaying what I have heard and read. Tesla's history
| is far from perfect. I think the target of issue has been
| their various claims and promises on 'self-driving' and their
| autonomous vehicle programs. Also, some possible issues
| surrounding the acquisition/merger of SolarCity.
|
| And while the shorts around Tesla aren't making much noise
| right now given all the momentum, it wasn't all that long ago
| that there were some loud short sellers alleging about
| various accounting frauds. Some quick 'internet research'
| here will dig up various allegations and statements from the
| 'haters'.
|
| More common at issue is that many traditional auto analysts'
| existing equity valuation models for auto companies 'break'
| when you plug in the numbers for Tesla - making it impossible
| to come to a 'reasonable' valuation they are comfortable
| buying at (as these are people investing other people's money
| need to be able to point to something that justifies the
| purchase if it goes south).
| swyx wrote:
| nikola stock only down 11% today, market cap 14bn. is this report
| credible at all? why is the market not taking this more
| seriously?
| Apocryphon wrote:
| This report only came out today, and it is very lengthy, and
| its claims likely need independent verification.
| fred_is_fred wrote:
| The stock market is not and never has been rational.
| SigmundA wrote:
| I have been watching Nikola for years wondering why anyone
| believes its BS, I didn't realize the deception was this blatant
| and deep, I guess like many I didn't do real due diligence, but I
| didn't invest millions in the company either.
|
| Very sad and disheartening to see it continue and get further
| investment, just make me think that telling the truth does't pay,
| selling lies does, fake it till you make it taken to the extreme,
| similar to Tharanos.
|
| The over promise under deliver approach Musk uses annoy's me but
| there is something real there, real results, Nikloa is literally
| riding on a play of a name of another company. At least Musk
| recognizes the issues with Hydrogen and he obviously has a grasp
| of the technical issues:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFPnT-DCBVs
| Ecstatify wrote:
| There seems to be such negativity surrounding electric vehicles
| in the media. I wonder if there's a vested interest deliberately
| trying to create this narrative. Electric vehicles are definitely
| the future.
| ponker wrote:
| Calling a fraud a fraud isn't antipathy towards electric cars.
| It's like saying that someone criticizing Donald Trump is
| against white men.
| mberning wrote:
| Reminds me of the GE hit piece appearing on gefraud.com that
| tanked the stock and is now nowhere to be seen. Not is the guy
| that authored it. I'm sure they made out like a bandit on their
| options.
| syspec wrote:
| I was wondering, how on earth this company even came to be listed
| on NASDAQ, since they have no products and no revenue.
|
| So I looked it up and basically it looks like they acquired a
| company which was ALREADY listed on NASDAQ then renamed it.
|
| > In March 2020, Nikola announced its plans to merge with
| VectoIQ[10] Acquisition Corporation[11] (ticker VTIQ), a publicly
| traded special purpose acquisition company run by former General
| Motors Co. executive Steve Girsky. This resulted in the combined
| company being listed on the NASDAQ exchange with the NKLA ticker
| symbol.[12] Nikola's stock began trading on June 4, 2020, a day
| after the merger was completed
|
| - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Corporation
| the_jeremy wrote:
| AKA a reverse takeover[0]
|
| [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_takeover
| syspec wrote:
| Thanks, I learned something new today!
| axiom92 wrote:
| From the link:
|
| _Nikola's Director of Hydrogen Production /Infrastructure Is
| Trevor Milton's Little Brother, Who Worked Paving Driveways in
| Hawaii Prior To Joining at Nikola_
|
| _Nikola's Chief Engineer: A Background Largely in Software
| Development and Pinball Machine Repair_
| yaacovtp wrote:
| Why were tweets deleted all the way back to June?
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| Totally reminds me of Theranos. "Charismatic" (I put that in
| quotes because they're only charismatic to a certain group of
| people, I think the more "mechanical" thinkers like myself view
| them about as charismatic as a used-car salesman) founder who the
| industry touts as "the next Jobs/Musk" excels at sounding like a
| ton of bullshit but is able to convince well-heeled investors to
| pony up a lot of money due to FOMO.
| ChuckMcM wrote:
| The sad part for me is that this reads like a profile of a
| "successful, new age, startup entrepreneur" relying on the 'fake
| it till you make it' mantra betting other people's money on the
| outside chance they can figure out how to do what they claim they
| already do before everyone else catches on.
|
| I would have expected that GM's due diligence team would uncover
| this sort of stuff prior to taking an 11% position in the
| company.
|
| Which proves to me, once again, that the way to get rich is to
| defraud people with a lot of money, and not a lot of insight.
| paulpan wrote:
| Anyone else getting Theranos vibes? As others have stated here,
| Hindenburgresearch is a known short-seller and so has an self
| interest to drive down the stock price of Nikola.
|
| Also it was only yesterday that GM announced taking an 11% in the
| company for $2B. Surely GM has done their due diligence before
| throwing a couple of billions in?
| https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/08/business/nikola-gm-badger-ele...
|
| That all said, everyone also thought Theranos was legitimate
| until they were exposed to be not.
| kolbe wrote:
| > Surely GM has done their due diligence before throwing a
| couple of billions in?
|
| I'm not sure there's any signal embedded in the knowledge that
| a company as incompetent as GM has done due diligence.
| yangchi wrote:
| I think you read the $2B upside down. Nikola paid GM $2B worth
| of stocks (11% of the company) to have GM manufacture its
| vehicles, not the other way around
| catominor wrote:
| In addition to $700M from Nikola to cover the expenses of the
| work that GM is supposed/going to do for them.
| foolfoolz wrote:
| this is interesting. i worked for someone like this who was CEO
| of a YC backed startup. everything was "in progress" but really
| hadn't started. the stuff that was "finished" was ongoing or
| never happened. it got to the point where every line in a meeting
| about plans i had to question to find the real story. you can get
| very far bullshitting your way
| codeisawesome wrote:
| How do we tell that this research has 'teeth'? Sounds super juicy
| if true! Would there be a 'ticket number' of some kind for an SEC
| complaint that Hindenburg filed?
| thedudeabides5 wrote:
| Well this is a first, top of HN with no comments.
|
| I'll say it, I have no idea of validity of any of these
| statements, need to go read. But do remember getting weird stock
| pump and dump emails about this company a long time ago and it
| always put a bad taste in my mouth.
| eigenvalue wrote:
| It does sound pretty bad, doesn't it? The guy certainly seems to
| have a problem with telling the truth. I think it's crazy to
| compare him to Musk, since Musk is actually extremely smart and
| knowledgeable about multiple areas of engineering. This other guy
| is just parotting the same lines, like "we are an advanced energy
| company that just happens to sell cars!". It's like the cargo-
| cult version of Tesla without any interesting technology or
| innovation. All that being said, I hope the author of this write-
| up has a good lawyer!
| f00zz wrote:
| He even ripped off the company's name...
| sokoloff wrote:
| Musk has also had some interesting/uneasy relationship history
| with the truth. This guy does seem to be taking it quite a bit
| farther and leaving a lot more daylight visible between his
| statements and the truth.
| saberience wrote:
| Musk has actually delivered ground breaking tech in multiple
| fields though. He talks big but he usually (eventually) backs
| it up. No other company has managed to send rockets to space
| and then land them again. No other company has managed to
| sell fully electric cars en-masse like Tesla has done.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| untog wrote:
| There's always danger of "smelling your own farts"
| syndrome, though. Like the whole submarine thing: it didn't
| work! No doubt that Musk is very smart and knowledgable in
| the areas he has excelled. But a few times now he seemed to
| have decided that this means he's smart in a whole load of
| other areas too, without much evidence. Another example is
| almost any time he talks about AI.
| nordsieck wrote:
| > No other company has managed to send rockets to space and
| then land them again.
|
| * orbit
| grey-area wrote:
| Not yet. The boosters don't reach orbital velocity,
| that's the second stage.
| liability wrote:
| NASA was reusing orbital 'upper stages' (although not
| boosters or ETs) for a few years. This little thing
| called a 'Space Shuttle.'
| throwanem wrote:
| Given how much of a dog the Shuttle was, you're not
| really making as strong an argument as you think here.
| nordsieck wrote:
| > Not yet. The boosters don't reach orbital velocity,
| that's the second stage.
|
| Fair enough.
|
| I suppose typing the whole thing out:
|
| "SpaceX is the first company to launch a rocket to orbit
| and land its first stage"
|
| is the most accurate way to phrase it. I was just trying
| to acknowledge companies like Blue Origin and Virgin
| Galactic, who have landed rockets or parts thereof before
| SpaceX.
|
| The big difference, however, is that those efforts have
| been essentially economically meaningless, whereas
| SpaceX's efforts have been quite impactful.
| Ar-Curunir wrote:
| It's not Musk, but the workers that did all of that.
| unwoundmouse wrote:
| ???? who corralled those workers? I always see this
| argument, if Milton has the same ability to bring
| together talented people as Musk does, his bullshit will
| be gladly accepted - both have proven the ability to
| bullshit, but only one has brought together
| groundbreaking teams thus far
| brohee wrote:
| They only land the first stage(s), and those don't see
| space...
| tankenmate wrote:
| The first stages regularly exceed the Karman line; the
| first stage's apogee is normally 10 to 20 kilometres
| higher than stage separation.
| ukie wrote:
| Yeap, like a pig with telepathic abilities /s
|
| Seriously, stop being so naive.
| empiko wrote:
| Yeah, he certainly invests in innovative high-tech
| industries and I like that a lot. But he also overpromises
| a lot, e.g. coast-to-coast tesla autopilot (probably not
| happening anytime soon) or something actually useful with
| the neurochip (also years ahead). some of his remarks on AI
| also tells me that he has a feeling that he knows
| everything about everything but that might not be exactly
| the case. he is a smart guy and he got rich basically by
| having a really good electronic payment system. but that
| does not make him a universal
| engineer/scientist/philosopher.
| superfrank wrote:
| I'm no Musk fanboy and this isn't meant to be a defense of
| Musk, but in my opinion, Musk exaggerates and over promises.
| He'll say intentionally vague things and let people fill in
| the blanks and not correct them when they are wrong. It's all
| a little slimy and grey, but there's usually at least a
| modicum of truth to the things he says or he at least
| believes what he's saying at the time he says it.
|
| From what I've heard recently Nikola just seems like straight
| up lies and fraud from trying to piggy back on the success of
| Tesla.
|
| Neither are good, but one is much worse in my opinion.
| outworlder wrote:
| > Musk exaggerates and over promises
|
| True. But he also delivers on most of them. What I find
| most optimistic about his statements are basically the
| timeframes. Self-driving is taking longer than initially
| thought, and so is Mars. But there's been major progress
| across multiple (difficult) industries.
|
| We can't compare him with the copycat company (not even the
| name is original!)
| [deleted]
| fossuser wrote:
| Not close to the same thing.
|
| Musk has a history of building and shipping successful
| products company after company in spite of a constant amount
| of people saying he would fail. (X.com, Paypal, Tesla,
| SpaceX, Neuralink, Boring).
|
| Nikola is a complete fraud that collected money from know-
| nothing investors riding on EVs and Tesla's name. They
| haven't shipped anything and probably never will. Bizarrely
| positively portrayed in the press alongside negative Tesla
| stories - I imagine because it's good for clicks?
|
| I find it hard to believe the SPAC that brought them public
| wasn't solely for the purpose of allowing them to steal as
| much as they could from the public before they shut down. No
| idea how well they played it - I guess we'll see if anyone
| ends up in prison.
|
| At least he got to con his way into a fancy ranch in the mean
| time: https://www.latimes.com/business/real-
| estate/story/2019-11-1...
|
| People like this make the world worse for the rest of us (and
| make it harder for honest startups to raise money).
| perl4ever wrote:
| It sounds bad, but I thought of another way to look at it.
|
| Nikola's product is the brand of being a hip, "with it"
| electric car company, like Tesla, but different, and they are
| selling it to GM. It's a simple straightforward win-win, and
| everything that looks like fakery is beside the point. It has
| solid value to GM precisely because of the inflated, arguably
| irrational value of Tesla.
|
| Now, I'm not investing, but it did occur to me to look at it
| that way. They are not actually in the same business as Tesla
| _or_ GM. They 're laundering cool factor.
| coliveira wrote:
| I don't see it as very different from Tesla, since when they
| started there was no real technology to talk about. The CEO of
| Tesla is also well known to be untrustworthy with his promises,
| having even being formally investigated by the SEC for stock
| price manipulation. I don't know the future, but there is a
| possibility that they will also develop the needed technology
| to make it all work.
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