Q4 FY2022 Earnings Call
TSLA · Preprocessing Report
2023-01-25
Quality
100%
61
Turns
11
Speakers
4
Sections
6
Exchanges
313
Claims
Quality issues

Entities by group 37

vehicle manufacturer 1
Teslacompany
company executives 1
Zachary Kirkhornperson
analysts 4
Pierre FerragupersonAlex PotterpersonGeorge GianarikaspersonAdam Jonasperson
AI training computer 1
Dojoproduct
sell-side analysts 2
Rod LachepersonWilliam Steinperson
driver assistance software 2
Full Self-Driving (FSD)productAutopilotproduct
electric vehicles 3
Model YproductModel 3productCybertruckproduct
accelerators 1
GPUtechnology
in-car computing hardware 3
Hardware 3productHardware 4productHardware 5product
sell-side firms 1
Morgan Stanleycompany
central bank 1
Federal Reservecompany
manufacturing processes 1
Giga castingstechnology
humanoid robots 1
Optimusproduct
custom chips 1
ASICtechnology
in-car computers 1
FSD computerproduct
stock market index 1
S&P 500product
sell-side research firm 1
Wolfe Researchcompany
manufacturing plants 1
Giga Nevadacompany
semiconductor companies 1
NVIDIAcompany
general-purpose processors 1
CPUtechnology
networking 1
Ethernettechnology
home energy storage 1
Powerwallproduct
grid energy storage 1
Megapackproduct
Ungrouped 5
Elon MuskpersonMartin ViechapersonInvestor DayeventAndrew BaglinopersonBattery Dayevent
REPORTING 37PROJECTING 25POSITIONING 108EXPLANATORY 23ANALYST 39

Topics 77

battery×18dojo×18cost×14cogs×12self-driving×10vehicle×9financing×9gross×8product×8fsd×8ai×7production×6competition×6cash×6pricing×3volume×3tesla×3recession×3raw material×3input×3

Themes 192

china×8per car×8full-year growth×3cost reduction×3supply constrained×3competitive position×3raw materials×2guidance×2competitive differentiation×2company framing×2reduction×2forecast uncertainty×2inference efficiency×2pricing×2future product use×2total vehicle market×2supply constraint×2energy efficiency×2training efficiency×2ai training×2efficiency improvement×2captive expansion×2captive financing×2full-year performance×1industry-leading profitability×1as a percentage of revenue×1asp reductions×1interest rates×1per unit×1production ramp inefficiencies×1model y shift×1cost premium×1controllable reductions×1regional build balance×1strongest yearly performance×1retail and commercial growth×1business growth and cost improvement×12023 execution×1customer interest×1production growth and efficiency×1plant efficiency improvements×1logistics and overhead reduction×1cost environment×1long-term cost structure×1near-term pressure×1healthy outlook×1long-term roadmap×1manufacturing and energy×1upcoming disclosure×1analyst question×1microphone unmute×1call quality×1capacity potential×1external risks×1full-year potential×1full-year commitment×1forward outlook×1ramp and factory inefficiencies×1manufacturing headwind×1cost trend×1investment cost×1cost disclosure×1capacity expansion×1manufacturing investment×1agreement×1reference×1competitive advantage×1manufacturing strategy×1pipeline development×1unannounced×1other products×1client demand×1future outlook×1macro headwind×1macro risk×1short-term volatility×1long-term leadership×1headwind×1factory cost headwinds×1factory cost impact×1production improvement×1supply chain reduction×1raw material inflation×1cost per vehicle×1lithium×1lower cost levels×1cost tailwind×1supply cost pressure×1price decline×1expected price correction×1maturity increase×1product improvement×1design changes×1supply improvements×1recession outlook×1margin improvement×1progress and take rate×1impact on take rate×1visibility and take rate×1adoption trend×1incremental improvement×1company positioning×1software and hardware×1autonomy computing×1operational deployment×1ai hiring×1robotics potential×1competitive progress×1valuation upside×1deferred revenue and margins×1incremental sales and margins×1upfront deferred amount×1package components×1feature release×1remaining rollout×1release and balance×14680 capacity in nevada×1semi allocation×1product fungibility×1product mix×1broad adoption×1allocation to semi trucks×1competitive pressure×1competitor funding pressure×1future landscape×1future rivals×1competitive horizon×1lead durability×1timeline×1competitive outlook×1rivalry×1ev market decline×1ev market growth×1chinese rivals×1future optimism×1commercial vehicles incentives×1future products×1form factor expansion×1undisclosed plan×1production bottleneck×1market expansion×1model complexity×1availability constraint×1battery cell allocation×1product progress and traction×1early stage predictions×1long-term timing uncertainty×1competitive positioning×1asic comparison×1asic design×1efficiency benchmark×1architectural advantage over gpus×1graphics and gaming use×1crypto mining use×1general-purpose use×1single-purpose training×1software optimization×1interconnectivity×1network communication×1efficiency target×1separate from cars×1importance for ai models×1applications beyond cars×1supply constraints×1vehicle outlook×1delivery outlook upside×1excess supply allocation×1captive finance×1comparative size×1captive products in europe×1retail energy business in the u.s.×1u.s. auto finance×1captive vehicle sales support×1captive growth×1captive slow growth×1cash consumption×1captive lending scale×1recession risk×1financing caution×1balance sheet strength×1cash balance×1investment return×1return on cash×1interest income×1valuation and discount rate×1long-term return benchmark×1fed rate risk×1risk-free rate×1vs s&p 500×1market value×1low-cost profitability×1future step change announcement×1

Key Metrics 60

cost×8cogs per car×8margin×7efficiency×6revenue×5costs×4production×4cost per car×4cash×4price×3input costs×3take rate×3financing×3cogs per unit×2demand×2volume×2capacity×2raw material prices×2features×2market share×2units×2vehicle outlook×2vehicle deliveries×2receivables×2return×2interest rate×2risk-free rate×2operating income×1free cash flow×1operating expenses×1cost of goods sold×1vehicle mix×1cost premium×1cost reductions×1operating margin×1unit volume×1battery cost×1cost per kilowatt-hour×1investment cost×1stock price×1market capitalization×1cogs×1raw materials costs×1raw material costs×1logistics costs×1fleet maturity×1market cap×1gigawatt-hours×1production output×1energy cost per frame×1training efficiency×1energy efficiency per unit of training×1inference efficiency×1loan×1leasing×1debt×1return on cash×1rate of return×1equity value×1bill of materials cost×1

Entities 415

Tesla×197Elon Musk×65Zachary Kirkhorn×43Dojo×19Pierre Ferragu×11Full Self-Driving (FSD)×11Rod Lache×10Alex Potter×6George Gianarikas×5GPU×5Model Y×3Adam Jonas×3Morgan Stanley×3Federal Reserve×3Model 3×2Martin Viecha×2Giga castings×2Optimus×2William Stein×2ASIC×2FSD computer×2S&P 500×2Cybertruck×1Investor Day×1Wolfe Research×1Giga Nevada×1Andrew Baglino×1Battery Day×1Hardware 3×1Hardware 4×1Hardware 5×1Autopilot×1NVIDIA×1CPU×1Ethernet×1Powerwall×1Megapack×1

Business Segments 131

Automotive×123Energy Generation And Storage×8

Sectors 97

battery×25artificial intelligence×24software×13semiconductor×11autonomous vehicles×7consumer finance×5energy storage×4robotics×2electric vehicle×2materials×1logistics×1capital markets×1telecommunications×1

Regions 41

Berlin×10China×8Austin×8U.S.×4Earth×4Texas×2Europe×2Nevada×2Korea×1

Metadata Distributions

Sentiment
positive 65negative 35neutral 132
Temporality
backward 23forward 58current 151
Certainty
definitive 39confident 72moderate 74tentative 44speculative 3
Magnitude
major 19moderate 148minor 65
Direction
improvement 25decline 7flat 2mixed 2none 196
Time Horizon
immediate 39near_term 75medium_term 29long_term 13unspecified 76
Verifiability
quantitative 50event 11qualitative 171
Analyst Intent
probing 13challenging 1confirming 7seeking_detail 17seeking_guidance 1

Speakers

Executives
ABAndrew BaglinoexecutiveEMElon MuskCEORTRoshan ThomasexecutiveZKZachary KirkhornCFO
Analysts
AJAdam JonasanalystAPAlex PotteranalystGGGeorge GianarikasanalystPFPierre FerraguanalystRLRod LacheanalystWSWilliam Steinanalyst
Other
MVMartin Viechair

Sections

TypeLabelSpeaker
preamblePreambleElon Musk, Martin Viecha
prepared_remarksPrepared RemarksZachary Kirkhorn
qa_sessionQ&A Session
closing_remarksClosing RemarksElon Musk, Martin Viecha

Q&A Exchanges 6

#AnalystFirmTurns
1
RLRod Lache
Wolfe Research11
2
PFPierre Ferragu
New Street Research12
3
APAlex Potter
Piper Sandler10
4
GGGeorge Gianarikas
Canaccord Research7
5
WSWilliam Stein
Truist7
6
AJAdam Jonas
Morgan Stanley7

Claim Taxonomy 232

REPORTING37
resultFinancial outcome for a completed period23
metricNon-financial quantitative fact10
operationalDiscrete completed event4
PROJECTING25
guidanceQuantitative expectation with number + time7
commitmentPromise with binary verifiable outcome8
targetLong-term aspirational quantitative goal10
POSITIONING108
strategyPriority, direction, or initiative78
competitiveCompany's position or advantages8
opportunityMarket condition framed as growth driver4
riskHeadwind, constraint, or uncertainty18
EXPLANATORY23
attributionWhy a specific outcome happened1
contextNon-company macro/industry fact22
FRAMING0
thesisFalsifiable belief about how the world works0
ANALYST39
questionInterrogative seeking information22
observationRestates a fact or data point10
concernFlags a risk or challenge3
estimateAnalyst's own projection or calculation2
sentimentOpinion, praise, or critique2

Transcript

Preamble
MV
Martin ViechairTesla
Good afternoon everyone and welcome to Tesla's Fourth Quarter 2022 Q&A Webcast. My name is Martin Viecha, VP of Investor Relations and I'm joined today by Elon Musk, Zachary Kirkhorn and a number of other executives. Our Q4 results were announced at about 3:00 P.M. Central Time in the update deck we published at the same link as this webcast. During this call, we will discuss our business outlook and make forward-looking statements. These comments are based on our predictions and expectations as of today. Actual events or results could differ materially due to a number of risks and uncertainties, including those mentioned in our most recent filings with the SEC. During the Q&A session portion of today's call, please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. Please use the raise hand button to join the question queue.
But before we jump into Q&A, Elon has some opening remarks. Elon?
EM
Elon MuskCEOTesla
Thank you, Martin. So 2022 — just going through the 2022 recap. It was a fantastic year for Tesla. It was our best year ever on every level. Team did an amazing job.
It's an honor, of course, to work with such an incredibly talented group of people. So, in 2022, we delivered over 1.3 million cars and achieved a 17% operating margin, the highest among any volume carmaker, I think maybe among any carmaker. While doing so, we generated $12.5 billion in net income and $7.5 billion in free cash flow. Importantly, the Tesla team achieved these records, despite the fact that 2022 was an incredibly challenging year due to forced shutdowns, very high interest rates, and many delivery challenges. So, it's worth noting that all these records were in the phase of massive difficulties. [inaudible] credit to the team for achieving that.
The most common question we've been getting from investors is about demand. Thus far — so I want to put that concern to rest. Thus far in January, we've seen the strongest orders year-to-date than ever in our history. We currently are seeing orders at almost twice the rate of production. So it's hard to say that will continue twice the rate of production, but the orders are high.
And we've actually raised the Model Y price a little bit in response to that. So, we don't — we think demand will be good despite probably a contraction in the automotive market as a whole. So, basically, price really matters. I think there's just a vast number of people that wanted to buy a Tesla car, but can't afford it. And so these price changes really make a difference for the average consumer. It's sometimes for those — for people who are well — who have a lot of money, they sort of forget about how important affordability is. And it's always been our goal at Tesla to make cars that are affordable to as many people as possible, so I'm glad that we're able to do so. And yes, so I think it's a good thing, all things considered. We're also making very good progress on cost control and we're seeing the cost production in Berlin and Austin drop commensurate with the growth in production, as you'd expect, so yeah. With respect to Autopilot, as of now, we deployed full-self driving beta for city streets to roughly 400,000 customers in North America. This is a huge milestone for autonomy as FSD Beta is the only way any consumer can actually test the latest AI-powered autonomy. And we're currently at about 100 million miles of FSD outside of highways. And our published data shows that improvement in safety system — stuttering here, safety statistics, it's very clear. So we would not have released the FSD Beta if the safety statistics were not excellent. Regarding batteries, production rate of 4680 cells reached 1,000 cars a week at the end of last year, and we're increasing capacity for 4680 cells by another 100 gigawatt-hours as announced at Giga Nevada yesterday.
Our long-term goal is to get to well in excess of 1,000 gigawatt-hours of cells produced internally and continue to use the self cell providers. So to be clear, we will continue to use other cell providers. Just that the demand for lithium ion batteries is quasi-infinite and will be for quite some time. So we feel we can scale a lot faster using both suppliers and internally produced cells.
And we've got an amazing plan for making the 4680 cell low-cost and high energy density. So, energy storage also saw record growth and that is continuing to accelerate. That's always worth remembering that the three pillars of a sustainable energy future are obviously electric vehicles, solar and wind, and then the third key item is stationary storage to store the energy from solar and wind because obviously, the sun doesn't shine all the time and the wind doesn't blow all the time. So you have those three things, you can convert all of it to a fully sustainable situation many times over, actually. So, I would like to just make it clear that there is a path to a fully sustainable future for humanity, and our goal at Tesla is to accelerate progress on that path as much as humanly possible. So yeah, so we were obviously ramping up Megapack production. And we expect it to grow at a rate quite a bit faster than our - the goal output.
So in conclusion, we are taking a view that we want to keep making and selling as many cars as we can. We believe we can keep pushing for strong volume growth while retaining the industry's best operating margins. As we mentioned many times before, we want to be the best manufacturer. But really, manufacturing technology will be our most important long-term strength. And we'll talk more about our upcoming plans at the March 1st Investor Day. And lastly, I want to once again thank all of our employees for delivering another record-breaking year. Congratulations, guys.
MV
Martin ViechairTesla
Thanks, Elon. And I think Zach has some opening remarks as well.
Prepared Remarks
ZK
Zachary KirkhornCFOTesla
Yes. Thanks, Martin. So as Elon mentioned, 2022 was a terrific year for Tesla. I also want to congratulate the Tesla team and also say thank you to our suppliers for your support during quite a volatile year.
On a full year basis: revenue increased over 50%, operating income doubled, free cash flows increased over 50%, and our margins remained industry-leading. Additionally, we continued to make progress on overhead efficiencies as non-GAAP OpEx as a percentage of revenue improved further. For Q4 specifically, sequential and annual margin was impacted by ASP reductions, as we are managing through COVID impacts in China, uncertainty around the consumer tax credit in the U.S., and a rising interest rate environment. Note that in 2022, rising interest rates alone had effectively increased the price of our cars in the U.S. by nearly 10%. Additionally, COGS per unit has increased on a year-over-year basis, driven primarily by three factors. First is raw materials and inflation led by lithium prices and discussed at length in previous calls. Second, we are working through the early ramp of inefficiencies of our Austin and Berlin and in-house cell production factories.
Third, our vehicle mix over the last year has moved more heavily towards Model Y, which carries a slight cost premium to Model 3. Partially offsetting these impacts, we've continued to execute on Tesla controllable cost reductions, in line with the progress we've made in prior years. These improvements include our continued work to gradually move towards a regionally balanced build of vehicles. The Energy business had its strongest year yet across all metrics, led by steady improvement in both retail and commercial storage. While much work remains to grow this business and improve costs, we believe we are on a good trajectory. As we look towards 2023, we are moving forward aggressively leveraging our strength and cost. There are three key points I wanted to make here. First, on demand, as Elon mentioned, customer interest in our products remains high. Second, on cost reduction, we're holding steady on our plans to rapidly increase volume, while improving overhead efficiency, which is the most effective method to retain strength in our operating margins. In particular, we're accelerating improvements in our new factories in Austin, Berlin and in-house cells, where efficiencies are the highest. But we are attacking every other area of cost and unwinding cost increases created for multiple years of COVID-related instability. This includes logistics, expedites, accumulation of material buffers, part premiums, productivity and overheads as an example. As the world transitions from an inflationary to deflationary environment, we expect a strong partnership with our suppliers on this journey as well. In that, we've priced our products with a view towards a longer-term cost structure. Thus, there will be an impact on operating margin in the near term. However, we believe our margins will remain healthy and industry-leading over the course of the year. Third, we are continuing to ensure funding is prioritized for our long-term road map. This includes expanding in-house cell production, bringing Cybertruck to market, development of our next-generation vehicle platform, expansion of our manufacturing footprint and growth of the energy business. We're looking forward to discussing these plans in more detail on our Investor Day in a month. Thank you.
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Q&A Session
Q&A 1/6
MV
Martin ViechairTesla
Thank you. Okay. And now let's go to analyst questions. The first analyst question comes from Rod Lache from Wolfe Research. And Rod, feel free to unmute your mic.
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RL
Rod LacheanalystWolfe Research
I think I'm unmuted. Can you hear me?
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MV
Martin ViechairTesla
Yes. We can.
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RL
Rod LacheanalystWolfe Research
Okay. Thank you. Just firstly, it sounds like your 1.8 million unit volume indication for this year is somewhat more supply constrained than demand constrained. Then I have a follow-up on cost. Is that an accurate statement?
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EM
Elon MuskCEOTesla
Well, okay.
I mean, our internal production potential is actually closer to two million vehicles, but we were saying 1.8 million, because — I don't know, it just always seems to be some force majeure thing that happened somewhere on earth. And we don't control if there's like earthquakes, tsunamis, wars, pandemics, et cetera. So, if it's a smooth year, actually, without some big supply chain interruption or massive problem, we actually have the potential to do 2 million cars this year. We're not committing to that, but I'm just saying that's the potential. So — and I think there would be demand for that, too.
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RL
Rod LacheanalystWolfe Research
Yeah. Thanks for clarifying that.
And on the cost side, the numbers that we just saw from you, as you pointed out, were weighed down by the 4680 ramp, the Berlin, Austin, Giga castings, processes, not at rate. Can you give us a bit of an indication of the headwind that you're absorbing from those things like you did last quarter? And then lastly, on cost, do you think that we can tease out an interesting data point from on where battery costs are headed from this announcement that you just made last night? If I'm correct, it looks like the investment cost per kilowatt-hour is less than half of what I've seen anywhere else, maybe $30 a kilowatt-hour for that capacity?
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EM
Elon MuskCEOTesla
I don't think we want to say the specific number, but it's interesting, if you look at the size of the — of Giga Nevada that is allocated to make 100 gigawatt-hours, is a small fraction of the size that currently makes about 35.
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AB
Andrew BaglinoexecutiveTesla
Yes. I mean, the goals we've outlaid at Battery Day on using the investment required to deploy cell manufacturing, I mean, that's been a key focus of ours and the team is doing a good job hitting the marks on that focus.
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EM
Elon MuskCEOTesla
Yeah. And it goes back to the point, I was making. I said, it several years ago, I think Tesla's really the competitive strength that will be, by far, the hardest for other companies to replicate is Tesla being just damn good at manufacturing and having the most advanced manufacturing technology in the world. And if you've got that sort of advanced manufacturing toolbox, you can apply it to many things and we're applying it now to battery cells. I should also say that, there — we have other products in development. We're not going to announce them obviously, but they're very exciting.
And I think we'll work for those clients when they — when we reveal them. Tesla has the most exciting product of any company on Earth by a long shot. And we'll continue to, I think, be in that position.
We've got more great ideas. I mean, we know what to do with. So the future is very exciting.
As I said in the last call, there's going to be bumps along the way and we'll probably have a pretty difficult recession this year, probably. I hope not, but probably. And so, one can't predict the short-term sort of stock value, because when there's a recession and people panic and the stock market then prices of stocks, worth value of stocks can drop sometimes to surprisingly low levels. But long term, I'm convinced that, Tesla will be the most valuable company on Earth.
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MV
Martin ViechairTesla
Thank you. And I think, Zach, there was a question on cost headwind in Q4.
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ZK
Zachary KirkhornCFOTesla
Yeah. I mean, our weighted average COGS for the company, if you were to assume Austin and Berlin were at the cost structure of our other factories, it was on the order of 2,000 to 2,500 of headwinds. So I think from there, you can back into margin impact of those factories as of end of Q4.
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Q&A 2/6
MV
Martin ViechairTesla
Thank you very much. And let's go to the next question from Pierre Ferragu from New Street Research.
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PF
Pierre FerraguanalystNew Street Research
Thanks, Martin. Can you hear me well?
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MV
Martin ViechairTesla
Yes.
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PF
Pierre FerraguanalystNew Street Research
Excellent.
Zach, actually, I'd like to follow up on the data point you just gave on cost. If I look back at the COGS per car, you guys bottom close to $36,000 in the middle of 2021. And then the number went up as you had to face with inflation in input costs and the ramp of Berlin and Texas. And this quarter, I think we are close to $40,000 and we peaked maybe close to $42,000 at some point last year. And so my question from here is, how much time do you think it takes you to get back to this kind of $36,000, which would mean Berlin and Texas and those input costs, all that stuff is normalizing, is that like — and that would be like a kind of like a 10% decline in the COGS per car? Is that something we can hope to see this year or is that too optimistic?
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ZK
Zachary KirkhornCFOTesla
The Austin and Berlin ramp inefficiencies in 4680 will make a substantial amount of progress on that over the course of the year, and that's within Tesla's control.
We're doing a lot of work on cost reduction outside of that. And we talked about supply chain costs, expedite, logistics, attacking everything. On the raw materials and inflation side, where lithium is the large driver there and this was a meaningful source of cost increase for us, we'll have to see where lithium prices go. And we're not fully exposed to lithium prices, but I think in general, is what we've seen from our forecast here, cost per car of lithium in 2023 will be higher than 2022. So that's a headwind that would have to be overcome to return back to those levels. So, I don't think we'll get there this year, but I think we'll make progress. And we'll continue to find ways to offset these raw material costs that we don't have control over. [inaudible] is there anything on that?
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Roshan ThomasexecutiveTesla
Yes.
Like on the non-cells raw material, we begin to capture benefits of indexes tapering out, but due to the length of various supply chains, it does take time before this is reflected in our financials. And while alumina is down like 20% year-over-year, steel is about 30% down year-over-year, the global non-cells raw materials market continues to be influenced by geopolitical situations in Europe, high production cost due to labor cost increases and energy spikes and disruptions due to natural disasters like typhoon in Korea four months ago, pandemic lockdowns. So, we believe that meaningful price corrections will ultimately come, but it remains uncertain exactly when. In the meantime, we continue to redesign supply chain to make it more efficient and work with our supplier partners to find more efficiencies, streamline logistics and transportation to reduce costs.
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PF
Pierre FerraguanalystNew Street Research
Excellent. Thank you. And I…
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MV
Martin ViechairTesla
Sorry, do you want to go say something?
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Andrew BaglinoexecutiveTesla
I was going to say, we're also — our fleet is starting to mature, the 3, Y fleet. And we're gathering a lot of data out of that fleet to understand how we can sort of bring some margin that we didn't know we had out of the product.
So over the course of 2023 on the powertrain side, we're actually going to go after sort of some materials where we're paying for more performance than we need, or we have more content than we need, without impacting reliability at all. And that will actually add up to a pretty significant cost reduction on the powertrain side over the course of 2023. So we're not just sort of relying on supply. We're also doing design actions to bring cost out.
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EM
Elon MuskCEOTesla
Yes. My guess is, if there is — if the recession is a serious one and I think it probably will be, but I hope it isn't, that would lead to meaningful decreases in almost all of our input costs. So we expect to see deflation in our input costs most likely, which would then lead to, yes, better margin.
I'm just guessing here. So, this is — that would be my guess.
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PF
Pierre FerraguanalystNew Street Research
Thank you, so much.
So as a quick follow-up, Elon, I was thinking about like FSD, and when you look at like the situation today compared to a year ago, it's — like the progress has been, like, amazing in the quality of the product, but also its rollout. And so, I was wondering, how much is this like impacting the take rate of FSD today? So do you already see that people are getting more excited by FSD, because they see it around them on 400,000 cars and they see the value of the service already, or is that too early to really see like, to expect like an uptick in the take rate?
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EM
Elon MuskCEOTesla
The trend is very strong towards use of FSD. And as you alluded to, with each incremental improvement, the enthusiasm obviously increases.
And — so, I think something that still a lot of people out there don't quite appreciate is that Tesla — of course say like, Tesla is as much as a software company as a hardware company, but Tesla is really one of the world's leading AI companies. This is kind of a big deal with AI on the software side and on the hardware side. With the Hardware 3 inference computer, still the most efficient inference computer in the world despite being, at this point, five years old from the design point. And Hardware 4 coming and then Hardware 5 beyond that, where there are significant leaps. And the Dojo computer, we expect to be using that operationally at Tesla later this year.
And we're seeing just a lot of world-class AI talent join the company. There's also the long-term potential of Optimus where we're able to use our expertise in electric motors and power electronics, batteries and advanced manufacturing to be able to make a humanoid robot that is actually useful and can be made at high volume with exceptional capabilities, because of the — or robot AI that, where we take the — because the car is like a robot on four wheels and Optimus is a robot on legs. But the — as we get closer and closer to solving real-world AI, and we don't see anyone even close to us in achieving this, the value — I think, you appreciate this and a few others do, but most don't know what I'm talking about. And so — but it's — this is the thing that has order of magnitude potential market cap improvement for Tesla.
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Q&A 3/6
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Martin ViechairTesla
Thank you. And the next question comes from Alex Potter from Piper Sandler.
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Alex PotteranalystPiper Sandler
Can you hear me, guys?
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Martin ViechairTesla
Yes.
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Zachary KirkhornCFOTesla
Yes
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Alex PotteranalystPiper Sandler
Okay, great. So a quick one on FSD. This, I guess, for Zach.
Obviously, you unlocked some deferred revenue in the quarter that will translate presumably into higher margins on every incremental sale going forward so long as people opt in for FSD. But was wondering if you're able to disclose the percentage of the $15,000 price that you're not going to be able to recognize as revenue upfront rather than deferred?
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Zachary KirkhornCFOTesla
Yes.
I mean, the way that we've structured this is a full self-driving package has two components. There's enhanced Autopilot, the price of which is listed on the website. We fully recognize that. Then there's an incremental, which is for the additional features of full self-driving offers and we've released a portion of that. And then there's a minority of the total package that's remaining that will be released over time as software updates are there. And in our shareholder letter, in addition to disclosing the dollar amount of the deferred revenue release, we also included in there the dollar value of the balance of unreleased deferred revenue that will be released over time with future software updates.
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Alex PotteranalystPiper Sandler
Okay, great.
And then maybe 1 additional question here on the incremental capacity in Nevada, the 4680s that you're planning. That's a lot of batteries obviously, and presumably, you won't be putting all of those in Tesla Semi. So I guess, two questions about that incremental capacity. First, is it correct to assume that all of those 4680s are going to be more or less fungible and usable in your entire range of products? And if the answer is yes, then if you had to guess, how do you think that 100 gigawatt-hours would be allocated between your various end markets?
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Elon MuskCEOTesla
I don't know, this is a bit too much guessing
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Andrew BaglinoexecutiveTesla
Yes.
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Elon MuskCEOTesla
But — yes, Yes. I mean, you're right. Not all of the 100 gigawatt-hours are going to go into the Semi trucks, that is correct. Let's say like — I alluded to a number of future products. Those future products would use the 4680.
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Q&A 4/6
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Martin ViechairTesla
Thank you. And the next question comes from George from Canaccord Research.
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George GianarikasanalystCanaccord Research
Hi, everyone. Thanks for taking my question. So you recently adjusted prices and that may have put many of your competitors in the back foot. In addition to that, capital markets have recently gotten a lot tougher.
So with those factors in mind, I'm curious how you see the current competitive landscape changing over the next few years. And who do you see as your chief competitors five years from now?
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Elon MuskCEOTesla
Five years is a long time.
As with the Tesla order part, AI team, until late last night and just we're just asking guys like, so who do we think is close to Tesla with — a general solution for self-driving? And we still don't even know really who would even be a distant second. So, yes, it really seems like we're — I mean, right now, I don't think you could see a second place with a telescope, at least we can't. So, that wouldn't last forever. So, in five years, I don't know, probably somebody has figured it out. I don't think it's any of the car companies that we're aware of. But I'm just guessing that someone might be right out eventually, so yes.
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Zachary KirkhornCFOTesla
I mean, beyond that, Elon, like in the vehicle space, even though the market is shrinking, we're growing and EVs have doubled almost year-over-year. So, like it ever keeps up with the trend of EVs is going to be our competitor. The Chinese are scary; we always say that. But like a lot of people always look at the EV market share, but we always look at it is how much of the total vehicle space do we have, and we're just going to keep growing in that space. There's 95% for us to go get.
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Elon MuskCEOTesla
Yes.
And I don't want to say like — I think we have a lot of respect for the car companies in China. They are the most competitive in the world, that is our experience and the Chinese market, it is the most competitive. They work the hardest and they work the smartest, that's so for the China car companies that we're competing against. And so we would guess, there are probably some company out of China as the most likely to be second to Tesla. We are — the Telsa China team is winning in China. And I think we actually are able to attract the best talent in China. So, hopefully, that continues. So, yes, so we're fired about the future and well, it's going to be great.
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George GianarikasanalystCanaccord Research
Just as a follow-up, the Inflation Reduction Act has created huge tax incentives for commercial vehicles. You mentioned an incredibly interesting product pipeline. Are there maybe some plans to accelerate commercial vehicle form factors outside of the Tesla Semi to help accelerate EV adoption?
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Elon MuskCEOTesla
Well, I was basically saying that, yes, but I'm not going to give you details because this is — nice try, nice try. Yes, of course, of course.
So, we actually look at like, what is the limiting factor for new vehicles because if the — for the longest time, we've been constrained on total cell lithium-ion production output. And so people said, like, why not bring this other car to market or that other car to market? Well, it doesn't really help if all you're doing is shuffling around the batteries from one car to another. In fact, it hurts because you add complexity, but you don't add incremental volume. So, it's sort of pointless, in fact, like counterproductive to add model complexity without solving the availability of lithium-ion batteries.
So, as we get — so we want new product introduction to match where the cells are available or that new product to use those cells without cannibalizing the cells of the other cars. That's the actual limiting factor for new models, not anything else really.
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Q&A 5/6
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Martin ViechairTesla
Thank you. Let's go to the next question. The next question comes from William Stein from Truist.
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William SteinanalystTruist
Great. Thanks for taking my question. You started to answer this earlier, but I'd like to ask this question about the AI elements of your business and ask if you could comment on progress around Dojo and Optimus and your anticipation for the likelihood, for example, for the company to disconnect the GPU cluster in favor of Dojo and to have some market achievement an Optimus?
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Elon MuskCEOTesla
Yes. I mean, obviously, with — just we're still at the early stages, there are big [inaudible] in any predictions.
It's like — I think, easy to predict long-term, but hard to predict the time in between now and then. But it's — we think Dojo will be competitive with the NVIDIA H1 at the end of this year and then hopefully surpass it next year. And the key there is — I think what's the energy usage required for a given amount of — if you're training a frame of video, how — what's the energy cost required to do that training? And we think probably — we said this already actually at AI Day, so it's not new information, but we do see potential for an order of magnitude improvement relative to GPU, what GPUs can do for Dojo, which is obviously very specialized for AI training. It's hyper-specialized for AI training. It's not — wouldn't be great for other things, but it should be extremely good for AI training. So just like if you do an ASIC or something, it's going to be better than a CPU. This is sort of, in some ways, like a giant ASIC. And we're able to — since we're operating one of the biggest GPU clusters in the world already, the — we've got a good sense of how efficient the GPU clusters operate and what Dojo needs to do in order to be competitive. But we think that it does have a fundamental architectural advantage because it's designed not to be — the GPU is trying to do many things for many people. We're trying to do graphics, video games. It's doing crypto mining. It's doing a lot of things. Dojo is just doing one thing and that is training. And we're also optimizing the low-level software too. So it had a various sort of, ground middle level so it's just insanely good at efficient training. And the intra-communication between the Dojo modules is extremely high. It's not going across an Ethernet cable. It's like — so anyway, the — we see a path to an order of magnitude improvement in the energy efficiency or per given unit of training. But we also have to achieve that. And so when will it be achieved? It's hard to say, but we do see a path to get there.
And then also on inference, like once you've got something trained, well, if you want to have a product that's a consequence of that training, that product may not be anything to do with cars. Then the efficiency of inference is extremely important. And we also have, by far, the most efficient inference computer at the — with the FSD computer in the car. This has potential for products that are in car even really in automotive.
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MV
Martin ViechairTesla
Thank you. And William, do you have a follow-up?
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William SteinanalystTruist
Yes. It sounds like the 1.8 million units you expect this year is supply, not demand limited supply, it sounds like by the lithium batteries. If you were to become demand limited, can you talk to us about your propensity to use price and your relatively high industry margins to grow units and share?
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Zachary KirkhornCFOTesla
Yes. To be clear, the 1.8 million is not cell supply limited. And I mean, we did address that number earlier in the call if you want to answer.
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Elon MuskCEOTesla
Yes. It's roughly — cell supply is roughly matched with that. And this 1.8 million cars, if we get lucky, it could be more. And then the rest would go into stationary storage, the Powerwall and Megapack. So, yes, so true.
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Q&A 6/6
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Martin ViechairTesla
Okay. Let's have the final question from Adam Jonas.
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Adam JonasanalystMorgan Stanley
Hi. Elon, first question is, is it time for Tesla to significantly expand the captive finco? I mean, you only have like $4.5 billion of receivables. It's basically nothing compared to other big auto companies. And then I have a follow-up.
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Elon MuskCEOTesla
Zach maybe is best to answer that.
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Zachary KirkhornCFOTesla
Yes. I mean, the way that we've been using captive financing so far is to plug what we believe to be gaps in the market of existing third-party products. And so we have a couple of offerings in Europe. We do loans for our energy business, retail energy business here in the US. We do leasing and we do a small amount of U.S. loans that are very targeted.
And so we're using captives to support market caps, as I mentioned. So basically, it's a vehicle to support vehicle sales, make sure customers have access. I do think there's opportunity here to continue to grow this. We are growing it slowly here. It is a consumer of cash, so we're being cautious on how we do that. But the plumbing is in place to do a lot more here. And I think we'll have to see how things unfold over the course of the year and make decisions real time as to how much we ramp it up versus ramp it back.
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EM
Elon MuskCEOTesla
I think if we see a severe recession this year, which like I said, hopefully, we don't, in severe recessions, cash is king big time, because it's in such short supply. So we want to be cautious about using cash for loans and that sort of thing for cars. I feel we're in a very strong position to get through a recession, because we really don't have any debt. And we've got over $20 billion of cash, which is great.
The cash is earning a ridiculous return, a good return. So it's like nontrivial. And the interest rate actually in the $20 billion is earning like quite a good amount. And I've made this point on Twitter a few times.
I'm sure a lot of people on this call understand the fact — the basic value of a security is a function of the risk-free rate or we'll see how risk-free it really is but the T-bill rate. So if you've got — I think the — I recall correctly, the S&P 500 has a long-term rate of return of roughly 6%. And so I think that needs to be very cautious about having Fed rates that potentially exceeds 6%. Like, if we see deflation, and I think we are seeing deflation then you would add the deflation number to the 'risk-free rate' from the Fed. And as that starts to exceed 6%, now you're starting to exceed the long-term return of the S&P 500 and starts to become questionable as to why don't just put your money in a savings account essentially instead of in the S&P 500, if the S&P 500 is variable and the bank interest rate is not? This is — so basically, the Fed is the risk of crushing the value of all equities, which is quite a serious, danger.
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AJ
Adam JonasanalystMorgan Stanley
Thanks Elon. And just a follow-up, I don't want to steal thunder from March 1st and in Austin, but how close are we to that step change improvement in BoM cost where you could sell an EV for under $25,000 or $30,000 and actually generate a profit, that kind of real moving assembly line moment in manufacturing? Again, I don't want to steal the thunder but just if you wanted to kind of wrap-up with thoughts there that would be helpful. Thanks Elon.
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Elon MuskCEOTesla
I mean, I'd love to answer — I'll probably be asking the same question, but we would be jumping the gun on future announcements.
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Closing Remarks
MV
Martin ViechairTesla
Fantastic. Thank you very much, everyone, for all your good questions. And we will see you again in three months' time.
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Elon MuskCEOTesla
Thank you.
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Martin ViechairTesla
Thank you. Bye-bye.
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