今年晚春時分，一陣騷動在特斯拉汽車公司（Tesla Motors）與一名因勇敢批判特斯拉汽車而聞名的記者之間迅速蔓延，又迅速平息，但這使得人們開始關(guān)注汽車制造中的一些額外費用，而這一直是一些科技公司在進軍汽車行業(yè)時并未意識到的。
據(jù)了解，每日看板（Daily Kanban）記者Ed Niedermeyer 透露，雖然并無書面規(guī)定，但特斯拉汽車在為客戶進行某些標準保修范圍之外的修理時，通常會要求客戶先簽訂全面保密協(xié)議（NDA），而這可以被解讀為特斯拉在試圖掩蓋某些車輛設(shè)計中的潛在問題，以回避美國高速公路交通安全局（NHTSA）日益嚴苛的審查。
NHTSA迅速召集了一場針對特斯拉的調(diào)查，速度之快令人吃驚，但結(jié)果并無證據(jù)顯示特斯拉Model S的前懸掛存在任何具有普遍性的，或根本性的設(shè)計問題。不過，本次調(diào)查卻揭露了一個令人不安的現(xiàn)實，那就是特斯拉在大規(guī)模市場中開發(fā)與銷售汽車的方式。
之前，特斯拉CEO Elon Musk對批判者的首次回應(yīng)，已經(jīng)成為一場特斯拉與痛斥特斯拉的媒體之間的標志性論戰(zhàn)。Musk指控Niedermeyer與華爾街的“做空者”同流合污，但他本人白手起家，財富迅速增長的現(xiàn)實卻讓這一指控顯得站不住腳。在這一點上，成熟的汽車公司絕對可以做的更好，他們最起碼知道一家公司的CEO絕不該像個NBA怨婦或過氣明星一樣卷入Twitter的世界。
不過，在我看來，Musk有關(guān)“做空者”的指控反而透露了他本人的真實想法。作為特斯拉的CEO，Musk最關(guān)心的是針對故障懸架的報道可能會導(dǎo)致公司股價下跌，而并不是Model S的懸掛系統(tǒng)到底有沒有設(shè)計問題（或者說制造問題），他也并不關(guān)心特斯拉要求客戶簽署有關(guān)潛在安全問題的保密協(xié)議是否符合監(jiān)管機構(gòu)對汽車公司的要求（當然，特斯拉還是修改了保密協(xié)議的措辭）。
Musk似乎極為擔心負面新聞可能會給公司財務(wù)狀況帶來影響。不過，除了柴油發(fā)動機排放門這樣的丑聞之外，通常這樣的問題還不至于讓老牌的跨國汽車公司及其背后生產(chǎn)研發(fā)帝國的高管憂慮到睡不著覺。
在爆出故障懸掛問題的幾周前，特斯拉又開始了新一輪的股票出售，以補充公司的現(xiàn)金儲備，但規(guī)模僅為15億美元。這里要說明一個背景，在特斯拉公司出售股票的前一天，有報道稱通用汽車（General Motors）將拿出大約1億美元，補償購買燃料經(jīng)濟性數(shù)據(jù)不符的雪佛蘭（Chevrolet）、CMC和別克（Buick）全尺寸跨界車的車主。實際上，通用汽車已經(jīng)支付了這1億美元，只是一些文件未能及時更新。
特斯拉有能力應(yīng)對這樣的問題嗎？
汽車是世界上最復(fù)雜的消費產(chǎn)品之一，而汽車的開發(fā)、設(shè)計及把關(guān)絕對是一項非?；ㄥX的工作，這點大家肯定都明白。在我看來，特斯拉最近深入汽車行業(yè)與消費者之間“蟲洞”的探險簡直稱得上一記響亮的耳光，提醒了大家為何像蘋果（Apple）與谷歌等富可敵國的科技公司也不可能獨自承擔整車開發(fā)與制造的工作。
“汽車可不是手機”，這是汽車公司的工程師和高管在向消費者與監(jiān)管機構(gòu)解釋消費電子產(chǎn)品與汽車的區(qū)別時，經(jīng)常掛在嘴邊的一句話。一些“攪局者”其實很明白這個道理，因此他們尋求的是如何以一種最有利的方式參與汽車研發(fā)，但絕不會直接去開發(fā)制造汽車。
而Musk等其他人卻選擇了一條不同的路。不過汽車的研發(fā)費用如此之高，恐怕是這些億萬富翁之前沒有想到的。
作者：Bill Visnic
來源：SAE《汽車工程》雜志
翻譯：SAE中國辦公室
A late-spring brouhaha that developed between Tesla Motors and an intrepid reporter known for skeptical Tesla coverage blew over fairly quickly—but not before highlighting some unaccounted costs of car-making that the tech world tends to gloss over on the path to auto-industry disruption.
In uncovering Tesla’s largely undocumented practice of expecting customers to sign comprehensive non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) before the company would make certain repairs outside the standard warranty coverage, The Daily Kanban’s Ed Niedermeyer shed light on what could have been interpreted as Tesla’s attempt to shield potentially faulty engineering from the increasingly scrutinous watch of theNational Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
A NHTSA investigation—convened surprisingly quickly, I’ll say—found no evidence of widespread or intrinsic design problems with the Tesla Model S front suspension. But the evolving situation exposed uncomfortable realities behind Tesla’s approach to developing and selling vehicles in the mass market.
There was a thin-skinned social-media tongue lashing that’s become a hallmark of Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s first response to detractors. His dislocation from non-billionaire reality will never be more hilariously evident than is his accusation that Niedermeyer was in cahoots with Wall Street short-sellers. Mature car companies know better, even before any debate about whether a CEO should be engaging the world on Twitter as if they’re NBA wives or desperate celebrities.
More telling to me about the short-selling angle, though, was what it suggested about Musk’s overriding state of mind. To Tesla’s CEO, the effect of the faulty-suspension story on the company’s stock price appeared to be the underlying concern, not whether the Model S suspension design (or, more likely, manufacturing execution) was faulty. Or whether Tesla’s NDA practices were not in alignment with regulators’ expectations of how a car company should relate with its customers when it comes to matters of potential safety. (Tesla did, as a result, modify the language of its NDAs.)
Musk seems to be immensely concerned about how negative news might affect his company’s financial position. Such a worry, diesel-engine emissions cheating excepted, generally doesn’t cause lost sleep for multinational auto companies and their asset-backed manufacturing and development empires.
A few weeks prior to the break of the suspension story, Tesla initiated another stock sale—this one to the tune of about $1.5 billion—to bolster its cash reserves. The relative meagerness of that figure was placed in perspective a day before Tesla’s stock issue when it was reported General Motors was set to earmark an estimated $100 million merely to make good with consumers who’d purchased someChevrolet, GMC and Buick fullsize crossovers sold with mislabeled fuel-economy ratings. In effect, GM was paying out a tenth of a billion dollars because somebody neglected to update some files.
How many of those could a company like Tesla handle?
Developing and engineering—and then guaranteeing—the world’s most-complex consumer products is an immensely capital-intensive endeavor. That’s not news. But Tesla’s latest abbreviated adventure into the worm-hole connecting the industrial and consumer universes provided, in my view, one of the starkest reminders yet of why even fabulously rich tech companies such as Apple andGoogle are unlikely to ever undertake the development and manufacture of entire vehicles.
“Cell phones aren’t cars” is the adage auto-company engineers and executives often deploy to give perspective to the extra layers of consumer and regulatory liability that come with manufacturing vehicles, compared with consumer electronics. Some disruptors understand and are working on how to most profitably participate in automotive development—without taking over.
Others, like Musk, have ushered in wonderful slices of disruption. But taking over has costs even billionaires can’t comprehend.
Author: Bill Visnic
Source: SAE Automotive Engineering Magazine
NHTSA并未發(fā)現(xiàn)特斯拉Model S前懸掛存在設(shè)計缺陷的證據(jù)。