Submitted by Sorin61 t3_z8ib3s in technology
moofunk t1_iyea3sq wrote
Reply to comment by SkiingAway in Competitors chip away at Tesla's US electric vehicle share by Sorin61
Yeah, though I still think the battery itself wasn't the issue. The EV1 was only manufactured in around 2000 units and thus never warranted cost optimization, and its demise just screams politics. All cars were hand built in a facility that built specialty cars, which is very expensive to do.
Even today, tiny electrics with mediocre specs that are hand built, are crazy expensive.
Say Tesla had started everything 7 years earlier, developing the Roadster between 1998 and 2003.
They would have been more limited by the power electronics early on than the batteries. It would have been more expensive, but would have been better positioned for cost optimization, even though it was also hand built.
Power electronics development today is continuing and helps to make modern EVs cheaper and with better specs.
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