Member Info for Dogberry101

Hi Robin
The Tesla question is extremely interesting and very pertinent, I have been following Tesla for some time and I am desperately awaiting their Investors Battery and Power-train day which was set for late last year and is now slated for sometime in Q1 this year. My take is that they will reveal quite a lot. From Elon Musks presentations for his new Roadster, Semi and Cybertruck it is obvious that there must be a new / different battery about to be unveiled: these vehicles are being offered with 500 miles of real world range at very competitive prices.
Around 2016 Professors John Goodenough (co-inventor of the Lithium-ion battery) and Helena Bragga put out a paper on a glass electrolyte battery effectively the much vaunted solid state battery, it was met with a lot of skepticism, interestingly there has not been any rebuttable from the scientific community so I presume it was true. It is very likely they contacted Tesla about this (they do use half of the worlds supply of Lithium-ion batteries ) and they do have a battery guru Jeff Dahn at Dalhousie University on the payroll to check it out. Apparently it takes three to five years minimum to develop and bring into production a new battery so given that Tesla is very interested and committed to bringing down battery prices they probably put it on the very fast track.
Last year Tesla bought Maxwell Technologies (makers of Ultra Capacitors and developers of a dry battery electrolyte for Lithium-ion batteries) and Hibar Systems (manufacturers of machinery and equipment for producing Lithium-ion batteries and other precision tooling).
Speculation here I think Tesla will be announcing that they have a new lighter, more energy dense, longer lasting and more durable battery that is cheaper to produce and very quick to charge probably with either a dry battery electrolyte or a solid glass electrolyte and that they intend to manufacture the new batteries themselves in enormous quantities

Hi Luke
This may be possible but is it commercially doable.
Tesla have put out specs on the Cybertruck and Semi indicating ranges way ahead of what is currently available; the Semi a really big fully laden 80000lb truck will have a driving range fully laden of 500 miles. The Cybertruck again up to 500 miles and almost super-car accelleration. With the batteries in use now there is not hope that these ranges for the prices given can be achieved. Not only this Tesla recently gave up all their current battery patents for free use by anyone (for bench-marking they said).
Now last year Tesla bought out Maxwell Technologies a company that makes ultra capacitors but interestingly have perfected dry electrodes for lithium-ion batteries and Hibar Systems which makes precision tooling for producing lithium-ion and probably other batteries.
My take on this - and it is speculation- is that Tesla have created a new much cheaper, longer lasting, faster charging, lighter and easier to produce battery and that they intend to build it themselves in massive quantities thus adding batteries to their vertically integrated production putting them even further ahead of competitors

Hi Luke
Tesla is doing very well and has had a stellar increase in share price over the last few weeks. I think you are correct in assuming that they will need a lot more nickel I am not so sure about cobalt. Tesla has reduced the amount of cobalt in their batteries and they are intending to do an Investor power-train and battery day (was supposed to be late last year but has been put off until early 2020) when they will be announcing the new battery chemistry (probably with no cobalt) that has been in development for some time and hopefully the million mile battery which maybe a solid state battery. Also where they are going to source enough of the new batteries for the expected huge increase in EV sales (Musk reckons he needs to increase battery production from 35 Gigawatt hours currently to 1 Terra-watt hours)

Hi Z cars
A good and useful find but where are they sourcing the graphene?

Hi Max
I just cannot believe that you have never watched Yes Minister and Yes prime Minister.
The ship of state is is run by a hugely experienced crew called the civil service. It is like a huge mega oil tanker plodding through the sea that takes forever to turn round; the politicians will have some say on the course but not much (we cannot go that way sir there are rocks, if we go that way sir we will run aground, if you wish to go there sir we will have to stop to re-fuel etc.)
I was a voter to join the EEC because the common market was a really good idea, I was not enthralled with the way it has gone (most of which our politicians agreed with and voted for) but I was a definite remainer not because I liked the way it has turned out but because getting out of it will be an absolute and seemingly endless nightmare. Anyone who thinks we are any closer to leaving with any sort of reasonable deal is deluded.
I am of the opinion that there is one thing that the EEC has accomplished which alone made it worthwhile - more that 75 years of peace in Europe.

Hi D220
Good luck with that. With respect you are looking at this from the wrong end. E.V.s are more expensive to buy but significantly cheaper to run (charge up at home overnight on off peak electricity) almost no maintenance and you can expect to be well tired of the car before you wear out the motor.
Unless you travel a lot away from home why do you need 250 miles of range? Most people in the UK drive less than 22 miles per day so electric cars really would suit most people (provided they can charge at home).
So that Tesla Model 3 might not be so expensive after all, or you could just about get a used Model S for a little over your budget (just check on the battery condition very carefully)

They were discussing on Bloomberg today how the phone O.E.M.s had worked their way through the stockpiled supply of chips and chip manufacturers could expect a revival of orders, I am not seeing much evidence in the share price here though.

I worry about these massive trade deals because they are likely to come with massive strings attached, do we really need chlorine washed chicken and hormone stuffed beef or very wealthy US health firms screwing the NHS.
Trump is a menace, a dangerous menace.

Hi Zebbo
Batteries do not just go into EV's Tesla already manufactures and installs battery storage from Powerwalls to store your spare solar power which you did not need during the day whilst you were out for use when you get home in the evening when the sun has set; to grid scale batteries like the systems in Hawaii California and South Australia, All of which used a hell of a lot of batteries. Judging by the efficiency and early payback times (the Aussies have ordered more packs already) there is going to be a huge demand for battery metals maybe including cobalt but perhaps not I am awaiting Mr Musk Battery and Powertrain Investor presentation due early in the new year.
The future is bright - its electric.

Greeting All
I was wondering if anyone on this board knows if we are or could be supplying products to Tesla. They are a very (extremely high) technology company growing at a phenomenal rate and have need of very high power very fast chips for their Autonomous Driving capability remote sensing etc. I believe we were a supplier to Nvidia who certainly were supplying chips to Tesla.
Any thoughts anyone?

I was watching stuff on wind turbines on youtube and discovered that the huge turbine blades are made of glass fibre but they are suffering from exposure to hostile weather conditions 24/7 /365 and whilst they appear to gently turning they are in fact spinning at speeds up to 180mph and that hailstones, snow, sleet, collisions with airborne particles rubbish and even birds is wrecking havoc with the structural integrity of the blades causing damage. Now who do we know with advanced materials able to greatly strengthen polymers and epoxy resins???

Excitement mounting over the pond as they await the unveiling of the much and eagerly awaited Tesla truck tonight. Could have interesting ramifications on the share price. He has pitched this vehicle as a full sized pickup truck with the performance of a Porsche and capacity to fit 5 or 6 passengers one of whom is a giant and numbers to exceed the Ford 150 in terms of towing and carrying ability, oh and it will look like nothing else on the market possibly like some Blade- runner armoured personnel carrier.
I am intrigued excited even just hope like hell he can pull it off.

Hi Kalan
I am really pleased with this company and the way things are shaping up. However - Surely it would make a lot more sense for the company to go after copper tailings in Zambia (of which there must be an awful lot) they know the country, and already have good working relationships with producers and the government and probably the necessary plant and equipment close to hand. Chile and Australia too on the other hand are both a long way away not only in distance but in terms of government regulation and oversight and plant and equipment.

This is a surprise a bolt from the blue, we may now find out what all the patented I.P. is really worth.

I don't really understand this -17% up here but half a percent down on Hargreaves Lansdown can only think HL are still on yesterdays price as US market not open/

So Tesla only got to 97% of the target. Sure 100% would have been better but I really I am still very impressed. This is a company that has not even finished building the factories apparently Giga Factory 1 is still being built, Giga Factory Shanghai Phase 1 completed and will start producing probably by the end of this month Phase 2 the battery plant is already under construction, what a phenomenal achievement in under 12 months.

Hi Scamp,
Interesting stuff, whilst chips are not an end in themselves and are only useful when inserted into some device there has always been a search by OEM's for a better chip a smaller chip a faster chip a chip that uses less power. I believe this better chip is what IQE make and this is what sustains my belief in the company and my confidence that it will perform very well in the future when the world sorts itself out. Incidentally you may believe that self driving cars are, what was it 'many generations away' I suggest you do some research on that because Elon Musk reckons his Tesla cars (and trucks) will have fully autonomous (level5) self driving capability NEXT YEAR not only that but a regulatory authority will permit them to be used on the road by mid 2021. Even with Musk's record of missing targets he does what he says he will do, though sometimes overshoots the timeline. So I think the only things that will run through many generations before it comes to pass are greenfly. Sadly for us in IQE these vehicles will not be using LIDAR so no need for IQE vertical cavity laser chips

fpvone
I am well aware of the short position here and I believe I got in at a much more reasonable price because of it. I think you may well be correct in identifying the shorters as being big oil I do not think the big conventional auto manufactuers have the cash to be doing it.
The future is bright - its electric.

This has just got to have more potential than any other share in my portfolio IMHO.
Currently share price is languishing while while the company is expanding capacity not only in USA (the Giga Factory in Nevada is far from completed) but also in China and plans appear to be in hand for another facility in Europe (sadly unlikely to be in UK due to Brexit).
There are a some of very entrenched, very worried and very well heeled vested interests (in particular the petroleum industry and fossil fuels consuming industries) that do not want this company to succeed because Tesla Success means their demise; they are very vocal very disparaging and very well supported by the media (I suspect advertising and lobbying activities may well have something to do with this - also Tesla does not do advertising).
Mr Musk did not build the company by himself but he does have a knack of finding and employing very clever can do people. He still owns about 20% of the company and spends a lot of time working there, more than enough skin in the game for me to feel reasonably safe investing here

Not a lot happening on this board, seems a shame that there is so little apparent interest in a very large Canadian company that appears to be be in pole position to advance medicinal and recreational cannabis to a huge potential marketplace only awaiting regulatory approval (which seems very likely).