There haven't been many new car companies created in the past few decades; Tesla is pretty much the only one with major ambitions that's survived and prospered.
Little startups have risen and fallen, but all the big players have hung in there. Even the bankruptcies and bailouts of General Motors and Chrysler required the one-a-century obliteration of the US auto market — annual sales plunged from 17 million to 10 million in a year — and a credit crisis during the Great Recession.
Before that, dozens of global car companies rode out recession after recession. Even struggling automakers, such as Mitsubishi, have avoided being completely wiped out.
True, the companies all have better economics and more scale than Tesla. But Tesla is getting there. Again, if Tesla can stabilize its balance sheet, it will find that its relative domination of the luxury electric-car market is a big plus.
Tesla's pitch of it being a Silicon Valley tech company will also fade as it operates, beneficially, more like an automaker. Car companies aren't creamed overnight like software firms are; automobiles are big and expensive and designed to last for decades.
Software is cheap, if not free, and ephemeral. Excuse the esoteric pun, but much of Silicon Valley is a castle of sand, financially. Car companies are fortresses of iron.
When Tesla starts to build new factories, it will be investing in a multi-decade framework, a strategy that's justified in an industry where some plants built in the early 20th century are still operating. Take Ford. The company is 115 years old and made it through two world wars.
Or don't take Ford. Take Toyota: 80 years old, a giant that rose from the ashes of a world war.
Car companies are very, very tough customers.