[flurie]

I'd seen some rumors that Tesla has been trying to slow down onboarding of other automakers to their charging network, so it's good to see information to the contrary.

I still struggle to see how this ends up favorable for Tesla in the long run. They did not charge licensing fees for the connector, and even if they charge a premium to charge non-Tesla vehicles, now owners of Tesla vehicles are going to run into situations where a Chevy Bolt has to double park to use a Tesla fast charger at <=50kW, doubly driving down utilization.

[fiftyfifty]

Tesla actually had $1.74 billion in revenue from its charging network in 2023, Bloomberg estimates that they probably made about 10% profits from that or $174 million. They are predicting that to grow to $7.4 billion in revenue by 2030. In my neck of the woods many of the Tesla superchargers I see are empty most of the time, presumably adding 3rd party vehicles is a way for Tesla to increase it's profits on their already built out network. Of course Tesla is still adding to their network but presumably as that investment decreases and the fact that they are charging more for non-Tesla vehicles, their profits will increase. It seems like it's turned into a nice little side business.

https://insideevs.com/news/715644/tesla-supercharger-network...

[hackernewds]

The impact of selling fewer cars due to the chaos of standing in mall lines waiting to charge is going to be a net harm I think to Tesla in the long run

[JanSolo]

> I still struggle to see how this ends up favorable for Tesla in the long run.

They're expanding their customer-base by maybe 2x or more. Those new customers will be be giving recurring payments to Tesla. For vehicles that Tesla didn't build. How is that not favourable?

[losvedir]

Tesla doesn't break out the details, but I think it's generally understood among investors that they just break even on Supercharger. Their profit comes from their cars, and the Supercharger network was a competitive advantage to get people to buy the cars.

I think they opened up the Supercharger network to ensure that the US didn't establish CCS as the standard and overtake Superchargers, such that Teslas have a competitive dis -advantage, but I don't think they're particularly thrilled to have all these other companies using their chargers.

People seem to think they're raking it in with the Superchargers, but distributing electricity is a low margin business. Same with gas stations where the money mostly comes from the convenience store part of it and such.

[wlesieutre]

The downside is that when people are considering which car to buy, Tesla has enjoyed their charging network as a strong selling point that other automakers don't have

[phkahler]

>> I still struggle to see how this ends up favorable for Tesla in the long run.

This will allow the rest of the charging infrastructure to become Tesla compatible. That may reduce the load on Teslas network, which they only built so their EVs could go cross country.

[bluGill]

More importantly, there are not a lot of chargers. Gas stations are on every important intersections, chargers are much less common and only rarely in places as convenient. (part of this is charging takes longer and there is the expectation the people charging are willing to go a little farther to find someplace where there is something else to do). As electric cars become more common every car manufacture needs to be able to say you can get anywhere with no worries as there are chargers. Tesla can get you across the country but you often have no choice where you stop to charge - if you pass a charger at 25% charge you are likely to run out a long way from any charger, while if you pass a gas station at 25% fuel you can probably pass several dozen more before running out and then are close to a station (more than walking distance, but an easy hitchhike) There are exceptions - I've been in remote areas where gas stations are that far miles apart, but they are rare, while that is still normal for EV charging outside of cities (and inside of a city you are more likely to charge at home and thus not care).

[ellisv]

> where a Chevy Bolt has to double park to use a Tesla fast charger at <=50kW, doubly driving down utilization

I’ll have you know my Bolt EUV can get 53, maybe 54 kW, for 5, or maybe 10 minutes, thank you very much.

But seriously while the max Bolt charge speed is rather slow I rarely ever fast charge. We recently took a road trip that required multiple charging stops and it was fine.

I understand it could be inconvenient for drivers who have cars that with a higher charge speed who could have to wait but I’ve never encountered this.

[flurie]

I'm on my third (long story) Bolt, I would pick it three more times if I could, and I'm certain that I've sold more Bolts than most GM salesmen, so my comment was more familiar snark than anything. I have done the trips into minimally friendly locales and spent longer than is wise at a Tilted Kilt with small children in order to ensure a healthy buffer for a trip home. This news is nothing but upside for me personally. Perhaps we will encounter one another at a Tesla charging station one day!

[peutetre]

> I'd seen some rumors that Tesla has been trying to slow down onboarding of other automakers to their charging network

It's more simple. The delays have been because Musk threw a tantrum and fired the whole supercharging team:

https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/inside...

> I still struggle to see how this ends up favorable for Tesla in the long run

Standardization gives Teslas more access to more chargers. It will also drive up utilization of Tesla's charging network because more cars will use more of Tesla's chargers more of the time.

https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/28/22596337/tesla-supercharg...

Tesla's chargers have been open to all brands for a long time in Europe. Here's a Kia charging on a V4 charger with no app and no Tesla account just as Nature intended:

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/yflZN0dLT8s

Tesla is just one charge point operator among many in Europe. Tesla's chargers are behind the state of the art. They still don't work well for 800 volt cars:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEJ2KtzMeh8

The Cybertruck is an 800 volt platform and charges faster on Electrify America than on Tesla's own chargers:

https://x.com/itskyleconner/status/1775014705222070331

EV charging standardization in Europe has driven investment in and deployment of charging infrastructure. The US has 193,000 public AC and DC charge points:

https://www.carscoops.com/2024/09/americas-ev-charging-infra...

Europe has over 900,000:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41466853

[rootusrootus]

Europe still hasn’t solved the need-another-app-for-every-charger problem.

Probably more effective than standardization is Europe’s love of pigovian taxes on gasoline.

[itsyogesh]

The secret lies in the route planning and not the chargers. EV Charging is a discoverability problem, not an infrastructure one. Tesla knows this very well, and just giving access to this infra isn't going to take away anything from them.

[IncreasePosts]

No licensing fees, but they are charging a premium for non-Teslas to use the superchargers.

[wlesieutre]

No licensing fees to use the connector but do we know they didn't pay any fees for access to Tesla's chargers?

EDIT - at least in Ford's case they've stated that they aren't https://www.cnbc.com/2024/02/29/ford-tesla-supercharging-par...

[idontwantthis]

Do you have a source showing they are charging higher prices for non Teslas?

[bradgessler]

Tesla bills themselves as an energy company. In theory, they could back their charging network with solar and battery storage and offer power cheaper/cleaner than competitors.

[mensetmanusman]

Tesla go was to speed the adoption of EVs. They succeeded.

[partitioned]

Most places most chargers are empty.

[tensor]

Yeah, I can't see how it's great for Tesla other than I guess extra revenue from charging. But the infrastructure already is somewhat constrained, so yes there will be more lines now at superchargers.

On the other hand, I'm happy we're not heading down the path of shitty walled gardens of charging, eventually Tesla owners will also benefit from being able to charge more easily at 3rd party chargers. For humanity this is a good thing, and increases overall efficiency of infrastructure greatly.

[MBCook]

They had to open their chargers to get some of the benefits from that big bill a year or two ago (build back better?).

That may be why. In low use areas it may be a nice ROI.

I’ve heard in high use areas things could already be bad from the increase in Teslas sold and piling Fords, GMs, and Rivians in isn’t going to lighten the load any.