Elon Musk is viewed as a visionary, genius or maniac depending on who you talk to. The truth is that whatever you view him as he is certainly changing the world. The industry that he is currently making the biggest waves in is the car industry through the all-electric car company that he founded called Tesla.
Tesla has released a few models to date with the Model X being the latest. The cars are beautiful and packed full of sensors and other advanced technology not found in any other cars. Musk has successfully been able to consistently create a package that outdoes other car manufacturers at a technological level the same way that Apple manages to package their phones, tablets, and laptops to outdo the competition.
This weekend Elon Musk announced that a new version of software would be coming to cars later this week. The update will be done over-the-air (OTA) and will add new features to the car. Other car companies have embraced technology in their cars but no other car company updates software to upgrade the cars capabilities. In truth other car companies probably couldn’t as they do not have the same level of control over the operating system in their cars as Tesla has in theirs. Most car companies currently offer a version of Apple or Android which powers their infotainment systems whereas Tesla’s cars run on an Operating System simply called Tesla.
By allowing this kind of upgrade to take place Elon Musk has clearly understood hardware the same way Apple has. This being that hardware if packaged right can be controlled by software in such a way as to be able to add new features even four to five years after the technology has been released to market.
This method of upgrades is ingenious as the person buying the product now thinks of it not as something with a limited life-span but a purchase that has the potential to get new features for years into the future. With this type of support from the manufacturer is it any wonder that consumers are confident enough to buy Tesla cars and Apple Products in vast numbers and at a premium to other manufacturers.
In a world where Apple has clearly won in terms of taking home most of the profits it is probably safe to assume that Tesla too will take home most of the big profits in the coming electric car wars that most of the manufacturers will probably be entering by 2020.
