After chatting with Li Mu, Schwarzenegger could not wait to work with Li Mu.
He looked forward to tremendous changes in California under his rule. GDP growth, fiscal deficit reduction, unemployment reduction, and foreign trade, finance, tourism, and other income increases.
Before he talked to Li Mu in detail, although he was full of ambition, he did not have a strong confidence. But now, it was different. He felt that everything was right in front of him.
Li Mu slept at Schwarzenegger's house for the night. The next day was his inauguration in Sacramento.
The inauguration was held at the Sacramento state government. According to the media, this was the most watched governor's inauguration in the past 50 years. More than 100 Hollywood stars and California entrepreneurs attended the ceremony. Apparently, even Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, was there to congratulate him.
There were even media outlets that printed headlines saying that this was the Oscars of California politics. For a time, the attention of the entire country was focused on the small city of Sacramento.
Unlike Schwarzenegger, who had gone to the state government early in the morning to prepare for his inauguration, Li Mu had not left Schwarzenegger's villa in Sacramento until noon. The same was true for Celine Dion and her husband, who lived in the same villa.
Schwarzenegger's wife stayed to entertain the guests at home. In the afternoon, she went to the state government with Li Mu, Celine Dion, and other guests to attend the inauguration in the evening.
Not many people knew that Li Mu was in the Schwarzenegger family, but Elon Musk was one of them.
In fact, it was Li Mu who informed him in advance and asked him to come to Schwarzenegger's mansion in advance.
Li Mu wanted to understand the current progress of Tesla.
In order to do online delivery in Hua Xia, Li Mu asked Tesla's battery research and development team to come up with a set of lithium battery pack designs for electric vehicles. This was a very small requirement for the team, so they quickly came up with a perfect design.
Although the concept of new energy was still many years away from being popularized globally, Li Mu still had high hopes and attached great importance to Tesla. This was not because he wanted to make money by selling electric cars in the future. More importantly, he valued the long-term accumulation of new energy vehicles in the development of new energy vehicles.
Companies like Tesla had been researching electric vehicles since the beginning of the 21st century, and they almost started from scratch. First, they researched batteries, then battery management, then motor, electronic control, kinetic energy recovery, and autonomous driving. With such a strong foundation, they were able to surpass everyone else in the field of alternative energy vehicles.
In contrast, the car brands that entered the alternative energy field after 2015 were subsidized. Tesla was like a genius that went from kindergarten all the way to a PhD. Those companies that entered the alternative energy field were like semi-illiterate people who suddenly got a diploma from a university.
In Li Mu's previous life, companies could simply take a car frame, remove the fuel engine, gearbox, and fuel tank, put a bunch of lead-acid batteries in it, and install an ordinary motor. Basically, it could be sold. In Li Mu's opinion, such a car was no different from an old electric car.
The reason why he wanted to invest in Tesla now was because he wanted to accumulate a complete set of technical solutions for alternative energy vehicles in advance. This way, he could ensure that Tesla would be at the forefront of the industry for at least five to ten years.
Toyota's advantage in hybrid vehicles had never been broken by other automobile manufacturers. This was not because Toyota's technology was difficult, but because Toyota had built a line of defense with a large number of patents around its hybrid technology.
With Toyota holding a large number of hybrid technology patents, almost no other company could come up with a hybrid technology comparable to Toyota without using Toyota's patents.
What Li Mu wanted to pursue in Tesla was also such a patent barrier.
In Li Mu's previous life, Elon Musk had successfully built a patent barrier against Tesla, but he announced that he would release all his patents to the public. Some people praised him for his generosity, but Li Mu felt that Elon Musk had no choice but to do so.
Li Mu felt that Tesla's biggest failure was that it had been "building cars from the clouds" for the past few years. This so-called "building cars from the clouds" meant that Tesla could not build cars from the clouds. It could only rely on imagination.
Elon Musk did not know how to hide his strength and bide his time. Hua Xia's advice to Tesla was to dig deep, accumulate food, and slowly become the king.
Tesla had only dug deep, and it had only accumulated a few grains of food. The concept product was released too early, and the production was too slow. This gap gave the gasoline-powered automobile manufacturers time to compete with Tesla.
It was as if two countries had declared war against each other ten years ago. Ten years later, before the army had finished gathering, the other side had already erected an impenetrable wall waiting for you. Even if you didn't attack them, they would still attack you.
In the past, Tesla stood against the entire automobile industry. One can imagine how much pressure and difficulty it was.
Therefore, Li Mu felt that Elon Musk did not disclose Tesla's patents in his previous life out of generosity. He was trying to divert pressure, rope in allies, or even lure the traditional automobile manufacturers to betray him.
After all, due to the special circumstances of alternative energy vehicles, it was destined that only by lowering the threshold for other companies to build alternative energy vehicles could the alternative energy field flourish. All kinds of alternative energy vehicles continued to appear, and countries continued to pay attention to alternative energy. All alternative energy manufacturers worked together to promote and promote alternative energy. At the very least, everyone could work together to build charging stations.
Otherwise, if Tesla was the only electric vehicle manufacturer in the market, he might not even be able to solve the problem of building electric charging stations in developed countries and first-tier cities in China in 20 years.
But in Feng Yu's previous life, Tesla's method gave birth to all kinds of garbage electric vehicles, which caused a huge waste of resources. It was not a good thing for the environment.
Therefore, Li Mu felt that if he was in charge of Tesla, he would never disclose any of the patents to his friends within the protection period. He was confident that he could make Tesla dig a hole and accumulate a lot of resources.
Elon Musk did not know that Li Mu already had a long-term plan for this business. When he came to Schwarzenegger's house to "report" to Li Mu, he was still explaining some basic concepts of electric vehicles to Li Mu.
He told Li Mu that Tesla had made great breakthroughs in lithium battery management technology. Li Mu nodded and said, "Has the high-speed charging technology been developed?"
Elon Musk was stunned.
He looked into Li Mu's eyes, and Li Mu caught the message contained in it at a glance. He translated it into eight words, "Oh my, you're really something …"
Elon Musk paused for a second and said in a serious tone, "Our research team has considered high-speed charging technology, but we haven't started to invest in it yet."
Li Mu asked him, "Then your future customer position will be the second car of the customer, and it will be difficult for them to leave the city."
Elon Musk nodded and said, "After our car is mass-produced, it will have a range of about 400 kilometers. A white-collar worker working in the city will usually have a daily commute of no more than 50 kilometers. This way, the car can basically work normally for a week, and it can be charged once a week. As long as a charging station is installed at home, it should be enough."
Li Mu asked him, "You said you want to install a charging station at home, what is the maximum charging power?"
Elon Musk said, "According to our current plan, once the Tesla car is mass-produced, we will first provide the car owners with a charging station installation service. This charging technology is not high, and the power is around 5-10 kilowatts per hour."
Li Mu nodded and said, "In this case, it will take around 8-15 hours to fully charge a Tesla car with a battery capacity between 80-100 kilowatts."
"That's right," Elon Musk said, "You can basically charge it in one night."
Li Mu asked him, "What if I want to go to Los Angeles from here? I heard it's around 500 to 600 kilometers. "
Elon Musk said, "It's very simple, park your Tesla in your garage, then drive your gasoline-powered car out."
Li Mu asked him again, "If you position yourself behind gasoline-powered cars, how much room do you have for development in the future?"
Elon Musk said seriously, "Li Zong, actually, I understand what you said, and we have carefully considered it. In the long run, our development will inevitably be to replace gasoline-powered cars, not to supplement them."
Elon Musk said, "However, from the current situation, it is too difficult for us to directly compete with traditional car companies, so we have to develop step by step."
Li Mu looked at Elon Musk and suddenly felt a little confused.
Does this guy not have the idea of using Tesla to attack the entire traditional gasoline-powered car industry?
In that case, he should be constantly adjusting his thinking as he does it.
No wonder he pushed Tesla out before the production capacity problem was solved.
Li Mu said, "The way you position the Tesla car is like using a fighter jet without the assistance of a tanker.
"In other words, this car can theoretically travel up to 400 kilometers, so the maximum range of the user's activity is 200 kilometers. It's like calculating the combat radius of a fighter jet without the assistance of a tanker. Beyond this range, it basically means that there is no way to return to the starting point."
Elon Musk nodded and said, "Currently, that is the case, but our current target users do not have a strong demand.
"Our target users are the elite group with high income, high education, and high social responsibility. Take the Toyota Prius for example. The price of fuel in America is very low, and Americans are generally used to cars with high emissions. The fuel economy of the Prius doesn't really affect money, so most people don't like it.
"Most people don't like the Prius, but it is very attractive to the elite group with high income and environmental awareness. You can go to Silicon Valley, Stanford, Harvard, and MIT to take a look. Most IT workers and university professors like cars with low emissions and low fuel consumption. They have a high approval rating for a hybrid like the Prius. If you take a look, you might think that Toyota has sold all of the Prius to American internet companies and universities.
"Therefore, our first target users are the people who drive the Prius. They live a simple life, have a strong sense of social responsibility, and pursue energy saving, emission reduction, and green travel. If we can provide them with a luxury electric car with a range of three to four hundred kilometers, it will definitely be very attractive to them."
Li Mu shook his head and said, "Elon, your eyes are too focused right now, that's not good!"
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