Investor's Corner
Tesla Motors is More Like NASA than GM
5, 4, 3, 2, 1, We Have Liftoff
I never get too excited or depressed about Tesla’s stock price. Stock analysts worry, and a lot. I can’t imagine how they ever sleep at night knowing that during those hours they are completely off the influence grid. Because Tesla went public it made a new bed and as a consequence, has at least two major challenges it must constantly consider.
- Build a new kind of personal transportation that must compete with a 100+ year old industrial age vertical
- Fund itself through a traditional stock market model while not making what that model values as part of their mission
Disclaimer: I own a modest number of Tesla shares and have for years, but it’s not my retirement plan and never will be. For me the primary investment is the Mission of Tesla, which for now means the Model S. I’ve owned one since June 2013.
The idea that someone would have the courage (and smarts) to start a car company from scratch and be able to differentiate it from all other automakers, as well as their products in every way, was extremely attractive to me. Others have tried, Tucker, DeLorean, but they were trying to compete with essentially the same formula. That rarely works out. In this case we have disruption and not the bullying kind which is what we often see in tech sector firms.
Car Guys are Wired that Way
I was nearly born in a car. My mother used to regale me with the story of how she just barely made it to the hospital. Five more minutes and I would have emerged while in the back seat of a 1954 Chevrolet Delray. Growing up I was surrounded by relatives who raced cars, worked on automobile, both personal and commercial, and sold them to the public. I remember sitting in my Uncle’s Chevrolet sales room in Ohio while we were visiting one summer and seeing a sign that read, “A new Chevrolet is sold every minute.” Gasoline and oil ran through my veins and I inhaled more carbon monoxide helping my dad in the garage than was probably good for me. For the record, here’s a list of all the cars my father owned. I think it was all of them. The year column indicates when the car was manufactured, not when he purchased it.
[Image source: ModelScoil.com]
Yes, there’s a very big gap between 1969 and 1982. Completely unexplained. Maybe we both failed to make entries in the diary. Never mind, it’s more fun to call “slacker.” We lost my father to cancer in 1992. He would have been proud to say he preceded his latest car in death by a full year. I frequently imagine what it would be like to pull up in his driveway with my Model S and take him for a ride.
As you can see, my father’s list is heavily weighted toward U.S. carmakers, especially GeneralMotors.The recent stories about how GM covered up defective parts for decades was disturbing to me as someone who rode in, drove and owned them as an adult. The last time I owned a GM car was 1989. I switched because I couldn’t afford to pay the maintenance fees.
Mission Control, We are Go for Launch
When President John F. Kennedy challenged America to “land a man on the moon and return him safely” in 1961, it was the catalyst for a series of missions meticulously planned and executed by NASA. Most had doubts we could do it successfully. The ones who believed worked at NASA. They developed a phased approach with three programs; Mercury, Gemini and Apollo. Mercury set out to successfully orbit the earth, study the ability to operate in space and recover both the astronaut and his craft. Gemini’s role was to study the effects of long term space missions on astronauts, perfect re-entry procedures and give astronauts extended practice time in a weightless environment. Once these were accomplished, the third program could begin. Apollo was about landing a man on the moon and returning him safely. I was enthralled with the space program growing up. I held my breath at every launch, was glued to the television for each mission and wondered what would come next.
Palo Alto, We May Have a Problem
Tesla is on a similar path. They started with the Roadster as a commercial prototype that would tell them lots about the viability of an electric car. From that came the Model S, an amazing form of Personal Transportation that won Motor Trend’s Car of the Year in 2013 and was rated the safest automobile ever built in tests conducted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) in the same year. I view the forthcoming Model X, a SUV version of the Model S, together as a stepping stone to the third stage; the Model III. A smaller, much more affordable car within reach of a large number of U.S. households. Assuming they can progress, the Model E will bring them closer to accomplishing the Tesla mission:
To accelerate the advent of sustainable transport by bringing compelling mass market electric cars to market as soon as possible.
The cost of the three NASA programs is hard to pin down, but many sources say that Mercury cost about cost $277 million in 1965 dollars, Gemini cost $1.3 Billion in 1967 dollars and Apollo $20.4 Billion in 1970 dollars. Obviously these number increase greatly when you convert them to today’s dollars. These missions were a stunning achievement and brought innovative technology to the private sector in numerous ways. In other words, we all gained benefit from these programs.
The point of quoting the cost figures is to bring perspective into the discussion. Today’s dollars always appear small when we look back a decade or two. The difference in these programs is that NASA was appropriated the funds from Congress, Tesla must navigate the murky waters of being a public company.
Elon Musk’s release of all of Tesla’s patents was a courageous move. He realizes that no single car company can deliver enough electric vehicles to make a real difference in the planet’s climate. The intellectual property is out there. Others can choose to assist or ignore.
BMW and Chevrolet have purchased, taken apart and reassembled the Model S in their war rooms. Why? Most likely to see how they can defeat Tesla. It’s a competitive game after all, including how Tesla sells its cars. A combined mission here, like the one NASA mounted would be an amazing feat of American collaborative engineering on a level never before achieved, this time on ground vehicles. Automakers coming together, including Tesla, could bring about a change much faster than we could even imagine. I know I’m describing a fantasy in the world of stocks and profits.
Can Tesla really do it? Well, they landed the real estate for the Gigafactory. A great start. I believe it can be done and am pulling for them to succeed. Actually more than pulling for them. I drive the car and and am an ambassador for the brand everyday. I wish them success, not just to disrupt, but to innovate on a grand scale. To change history. A chance like that doesn’t come along all that often.
Image Credits: NASA, Tesla Motors, ModelScoil.com
Originally posted on ModelScoil
Elon Musk
SpaceX turned a heralding moment for Starship into its greatest moment
Starship reached orbit despite losing an engine, deployed 26 Starlink V3 satellites on Flight 14.
SpaceX’s Starship reached orbit for the first time on Monday, and for a few nail-biting minutes it looked like it wouldn’t. During ascent on Flight 14, one of Ship 41’s six Raptor engines shut down early, and SpaceX’s livestream host Dan Huot told viewers the team had decided not to commit to orbit. Minutes later, after what Huot described as a lot of conversation in the control room, the final poll came back in favor, and a roughly 19 second burn of a single Raptor pushed the ship into orbit about 170 miles up.
The reversal matters because SpaceX had written the exit ramp into the mission plan. The company said it would only fire the orbital insertion burn if flight controllers confirmed enough backup hardware remained for the deorbit burn, a condition Teslarati laid out ahead of the flight. Losing an engine was exactly the scenario that rule was built for.
Pressing forward fits Elon Musk’s history. Falcon 1 failed three straight times before its fourth launch reached orbit in 2008, with SpaceX nearly out of money, and Starship was developed by flying prototypes until they broke. What changed this year SpaceX going public, and with $SPCX sliding below its IPO price in July when Flight 13 slipped, the short interest climbed significantly, as Teslarati reported at the time. A Starship potentially lost today with revenue generating next-gen Starlink satellites aboard would have landed directly on shareholders.
Splashdown confirmed. Congratulations to the entire SpaceX team on the first orbital flight of Starship! pic.twitter.com/urjmiwnvNl
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) September 28, 2026
That pressure showed up after orbit. SpaceX cut a flight planned to last nearly 10 hours to about three, moving splashdown from west of Chile to the North Pacific near Hawaii. SpaceX gave no reason, though Musk said this month the company was being extremely cautious about debris risk. The single Raptor for deorbit worked, and Ship 41 completed its flip and landing burn before breaking apart in the water, an outcome SpaceX expected. Musk has structured SpaceX’s governance to shield long term bets from market pressure.
The payload is the bigger business story. Musk posted that all 26 Starlink V3 satellites deployed and are “operating nominally.” Each V3 is rated for about 1 Tbps of downlink and 160 Gbps of uplink, so this single launch adds roughly 26 Tbps, about 10 times what a Falcon 9 load of V2 Mini satellites adds. The V3 is too large for Falcon 9, making Starship the only vehicle that can build out the planned 100,000 satellite constellation, at up to 60 per flight once it reaches routine service. Unlike the 20 V3 units on Flight 13, which reentered on a suborbital path, these will raise their orbits and could begin serving customers within weeks and bring in hundreds of millions of additional dollars in projected Starlink revenue.
SpaceX has already begun winding down Falcon 9 Starlink launches from Florida in favor of Starship. Reported targets put Flight 15 as early as October 19, leaving about three weeks to diagnose Monday’s engine shutdown before the next orbital attempt.
Starship’s 14th flight is set to launch on Monday, Sept 28. The 75-minute launch window opens at 7:15 a.m. CT. Live coverage of the mission starts ~35 minutes before launch → https://t.co/uQKQvgaTmJ
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) September 27, 2026
Elon Musk
SpaceX just got the green light Starship has waited years for
The FAA has cleared Starship Flight 14, setting up SpaceX’s first orbital attempt on Monday.
SpaceX has cleared the last regulatory hurdle standing between Starship and its first trip to orbit. The Federal Aviation Administration issued the launch license for Starship Flight 14 late Saturday, keeping the mission on track for liftoff Monday, September 28, from Pad 2 at Starbase, Texas.
The 75 minute launch window opens at 7:15 a.m. Central, and Boca Chica Beach closures are also scheduled for September 29 and 30 as backup dates. This will be Starship’s first revenue generating mission.
The license was the missing piece after SpaceX completed a full wet dress rehearsal with Booster 21 and Ship 41 on September 24. At the time, the company said the flight remained on track pending regulatory approval. Because Flight 14 flies an orbital profile, the FAA had to sign off on a modified license that met its safety, payload and financial responsibility requirements.
Observers combing through the new FAA paperwork also noticed that lightning no longer appears among Starship’s listed launch hazards. If that holds, it matters more for where Starship is headed than for Monday’s attempt. Florida and Louisiana, home to LC-39A and the planned Starbase Louisiana site, see some of the most frequent lightning in the United States.
SpaceX tells the FCC that Starship Flight 14 is going to orbit
Flight 14 is the mission SpaceX has been building toward for months. Ship 41 will carry 26 Starlink V3 satellites, the first operational V3 units to be deployed, and attempt roughly six orbits at about 275 kilometers over a flight lasting just under 10 hours. SpaceX says the ship will only perform its orbital insertion burn after flight controllers confirm enough hardware redundancy remains for the deorbit burn at the end of the mission. Ship 41 is targeting a splashdown in the Pacific west of Chile, while Super Heavy will return to the Gulf of Mexico.
The date carries some symbolism as well. A Monday launch would come 10 years and one day after Elon Musk first presented the Interplanetary Transport System, the design that became Starship, at the International Astronautical Congress in Guadalajara, Mexico.
SpaceX has not announced what comes next, but air traffic planning slides reported this week, list Flight 15 no earlier than October 19 and a first Starship launch from LC-39A in Florida no earlier than October 30. Both dates depend on how Monday goes.
Investor's Corner
Tesla Optimus Gen 3 shows off a cleaner, factory-ready design in new app discovery
Renders hidden inside Tesla’s Android app show Optimus Gen 3’s design before any official reveal.
![Tesla Optimus Gen 3 [Credit: Tesla]](https://www.teslarati.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/tesla-optimus-gen3-diner.jpg)
Tesla may have accidentally given a first look at its newest Optimus Gen 3 humanoid robot when photos were found in the Tesla smartphone app.
Design files tucked inside a recent Android version of the Tesla app appear to show the third generation humanoid robot next to the older Gen 2.5 prototype. The assets were extracted from the app package by Tesla community member @wholemars, who posted the renders on X late Tuesday night before deleting them. The Tesla Newswire reshared the side by side comparison on Wednesday, and the images have circulated widely since.
Tesla Optimus Gen 2.5 vs Gen 3 comparison via @WholeMars on X
The files are labeled “gen3” and were built as models for Tesla app’s own interface, as validated directly by Grok to be official.
The comparison shows a robot that looks built for a factory line rather than a lab bench. Gen 2.5’s exposed mechanical linkages and gold plating on the knees and shins are gone. In their place, Gen 3 uses matte black fairings on the lower legs, paired with a more contoured champagne gold body. Flexible covers now seal the joint where the torso meets the upper thighs, keeping bearings and moving parts sealed from debris and unnecessary contact.
The body panels fit more tightly, and the hands, which Tesla has said carry 22 degrees of freedom, look far more refined than those on earlier units.
This most recent leak fills a gap Tesla has left open for most of the year. Elon Musk said on March 31 that Optimus 3 was walking around but needed “some finishing touches” before it could be shown, a delay Teslarati covered when Tesla missed its first quarter reveal target. Musk later said Tesla would hold the design back until closer to production, partly to keep competitors from copying it. No reveal date has been announced.
The app itself has been preparing for Optimus for months. In July, code in the Tesla app pointed to a dedicated robot phone key, a consent screen for collecting video and spatial data while Optimus works inside a home, and an alert system for low battery and mechanical faults. Finished 3D models of Gen 3 suggest the interface owners will eventually use is moving past placeholder code toward something Tesla intends to ship.
Manufacturing is moving in parallel. Tesla tore out the original Model S and Model X lines at Fremont this summer to make room for Optimus production, with a planned capacity of one million robots a year. At Giga Texas, the steel frame of a dedicated Optimus factory is nearing completion ahead of a targeted 2027 start, with Musk pointing to an eventual output of 10 million units annually.
SpaceX turned a heralding moment for Starship into its greatest moment
Tesla Cybercab fleet doubles to well over 100 units
