Rebirth of England.

Chapter 779: The Lonely Terminator

Interestingly, it seems that Tesla became a blockbuster after launching the Model S, which also became Tesla's best-selling model...

But the fact is that when Tesla first launched the Model S, because the car had some problems, sales were not good, forcing Musk to turn nearly 500 Tesla technicians into salesmen and let them do their best to promote the Model S...

Even at that time, Musk took the initiative to approach Google, hoping to sell Tesla to them.

What is surprising is that the employees of Tesla are still very powerful. They sold more than 10,000 Model S cars, which brought Tesla back to life.

And the Model S also began to be gradually accepted by consumers, which eventually led to the exaggerated scene that the market value of Tesla exceeded the total of other traditional car manufacturers...

Now Musk, in front of Barron, appears very confident in both his words and actions.

But Baron knows that even he himself is not so sure whether Tesla's new models can be successful.

Otherwise, he would not have thought of selling Tesla to Google later...

If Baron himself didn't know much about the automotive industry in his previous life, he would have had some ideas - should he wait until the Model S is on the market and Musk intends to sell Tesla and then buy the company?
But what makes Barron a little unsure is that without Musk, can Tesla still launch as many popular car models as in the past?
He finally decided to put the idea aside for the time being and observe what happened with Tesla before making a decision.

British Motor Group has taken the initiative to cooperate with Tesla to conduct research on electric vehicles. What do other car companies think?

The fact is, I don't have any opinion on it, and I even feel like I'm just watching it for fun.

After all, at this time, electric vehicles have not shown much development potential - yes, many people believe that electric vehicles will be a trend in the future, but you need to know that often times, the company that can develop a new technology may not be the one that "pioneers" this technology.

In other words, many car companies are also developing electric vehicles, but they have not invested too much energy in it. Moreover, the development direction of electric vehicles, such as the batteries they use, and the technical route may not be certain. For example, Japanese car companies are more optimistic about hydrogen energy batteries...

These car companies think that new energy vehicles, including electric vehicles, may indeed be successful in the future, but certainly not now - they believe that many technologies are not mature, and compared to traditional fuel vehicles, electric vehicles still have a long way to go. Therefore, grasping the current advantages in the field of fuel vehicles is the top priority. These vested interests will certainly not take the initiative to carry out a revolution.

Just like Tesla, even after it launched the Roadster, no one would have thought that it would be so successful with the next Model S.

Otherwise, if Tesla could really see this point, it would not have been in financial crisis all the time. Those investors or car companies would have rushed to invest in it long ago.

Therefore, the British Automobile Group's investment in Tesla can only be seen as a blind bet on their part.

In Musk's view, BMG's cooperation with them does seem to show its interest in electric vehicles, but judging from the brands owned by BMG and their actions in the field of electric vehicles, the goals of this car company are different from those of Tesla. Tesla's Model S is still targeted at models of brands such as Mercedes-Benz and BMW.

The Romanian Rimac Automobili company previously acquired by British Motor Group, the Concept One electric supercar that just debuted at the Shanghai World Expo, and the company's cooperation with Aston Martin show that British Motor Group is targeting the high-end luxury market of supercars in the field of electric vehicles, and will not compete with Tesla.

What's more, even if the British Motor Group is interested in mid-range electric cars, Musk will not care too much - on the one hand, at this time he certainly cannot know for sure that Tesla will almost monopolize the market in this field for a period of time and will be able to threaten traditional fuel vehicles; on the other hand, Tesla is now often squeezed out by traditional fuel vehicle companies because of its development of electric vehicles. If there is such a company that also enters the field of electric vehicles, at least the two sides can be considered allies... Therefore, no matter what, at least at this time, the cooperation between Tesla and the British Motor Group is still very harmonious, and both sides are also devoting all their efforts to the cooperative development of electric vehicle technology.

After visiting Tesla's headquarters, Barron returned to Los Angeles and stayed there for only one day. He talked with Annika Dawson, CEO of Blue Valley Capital, about investing in Hollywood and then left.

The main reason is that he is not planning to meet with California Governor Schwarzenegger. After all, the "Terminator" is destined to step down as governor at the beginning of next year, and it is irreversible.

It can be said that when he took office in 2003, he was highly anticipated, but now he is in such a miserable state.

When Schwarzenegger first came to power, he launched a series of reform policies and promised voters to "audit everything and end crazy fiscal spending."

In 2004, Schwarzenegger was at the peak of his political career, with a 65% approval rating, and then in 2006, he easily won re-election.

However, during Schwarzenegger's second term as governor, the American financial crisis swept the world. Under the impact of the financial tsunami, California's finances were on the verge of bankruptcy...

In fact, the California government had already run out of cash as early as February 2009, when it faced a deficit of up to $2 billion!
Rating agency Standard & Poor's had earlier downgraded California's state bond rating.

Under such circumstances, Schwarzenegger had to announce that most officials would have an 18% pay cut, and the state government would have to pay its employees and contract workers in the form of "wage IOUs". Employees and contract workers could use the IOUs to cash their wages when the state government had money in the future - many civil servants have even begun taking unpaid leave. In addition, the state government will also have to cut the education and social welfare budgets.

Since the financial crisis, California's economy has been hit hard by the collapse of real estate, a sharp drop in tax revenue, and a soaring unemployment rate. The state government's finances have been in crisis. In mid-May last year, the California government announced the auction of seven properties to raise money, including a large stadium, convention center, etc.

In order to make up for the huge budget deficit, the California government proposed six bills and held a referendum. These bills included increasing taxes, expanding debt, and cutting spending. The only bill passed by angry voters was that government workers were not allowed to get a pay raise when the state government was in deficit.

Ultimately, since most of the bills proposed by Schwarzenegger did not receive voter support, the state government had to drastically cut education, health care, and social welfare spending, including cutting 5000 civil servants, releasing prisoners from prison early, closing some fire departments, canceling health insurance subsidies for poor children, and reducing subsidies for community colleges and abused women and children, which had the greatest impact on vulnerable groups.

Therefore, in this California gubernatorial election, Schwarzenegger lost to Jerry Brown of the Donkey Party...

During Schwarzenegger's tenure, California became the first state in the United States to implement mandatory controls on greenhouse gas emissions from factories, power plants and smelters - this is the only political legacy Schwarzenegger left to California.

In addition, when Schwarzenegger left office, California's fiscal deficit was as high as $254 billion, far exceeding the $102 billion when he first took office.

According to some American media, during Schwarzenegger's tenure, California went from a wealthy state known as the "eighth largest economy in the world" to a place where "no one wants to work."

Well, it's very sad.

(End of this chapter)