Financing Elio Motors Development And Production

[Lil4X]

The first several hundred Elios out the door will probably be wrapped in several hundred, not to say thousand, dollar bills. Volume production is like that. You don't just start stamping out Elios like Oreos overnight. Solidifying the design and planning manufacture via a number of vendors is a big and very expensive step. Physical facilities and tooling are a huge front-end cost. Hiring and training workers comes next as you begin to orchestrate your vendors for just-in-time delivery. Profit is really a distant goal in these instances as you ramp up to your first goal production levels. Your Elio is going to be largely hand-made for the first few months of production as the line speed begins to tick upward.

But look at the long term. Where will EM be after three years of full production? That's where your "economies of scale" really begin to kick in. If you look at postwar Germany's production of their "peoples car", you can imagine Der Fuhrer funded the engineering development of the VW "Beetle"; but it was private enterprise that opened plants around the world, altered the design for efficient manufacturing then designed the manufacturing process that made the vehicle one of the most loved, and sold, in history. It took a while, but with determined effort and a good product based on sound engineering and realistic goals, they got there . . . and Volkswagenwerke Aktiengesellschaft made tons of money.

 

[3 Card]

The first several hundred Elios out the door will probably be wrapped in several hundred, not to say thousand, dollar bills. Volume production is like that. You don't just start stamping out Elios like Oreos overnight. Solidifying the design and planning manufacture via a number of vendors is a big and very expensive step. Physical facilities and tooling are a huge front-end cost. Hiring and training workers comes next as you begin to orchestrate your vendors for just-in-time delivery. Profit is really a distant goal in these instances as you ramp up to your first goal production levels. Your Elio is going to be largely hand-made for the first few months of production as the line speed begins to tick upward.

But look at the long term. Where will EM be after three years of full production? That's where your "economies of scale" really begin to kick in. If you look at postwar Germany's production of their "peoples car", you can imagine Der Fuhrer funded the engineering development of the VW "Beetle"; but it was private enterprise that opened plants around the world, altered the design for efficient manufacturing then designed the manufacturing process that made the vehicle one of the most loved, and sold, in history. It took a while, but with determined effort and a good product based on sound engineering and realistic goals, they got there . . . and Volkswagenwerke Aktiengesellschaft made tons of money.

Yep Hitler was a for the people guy until power went to his head..Without him there would be no vw bug..

 

[Rickb]

10 w asseline every other news release from Elio..

I gather that you are no longer an Elio Enthusiast.

 

[3 Card]

Are you serious?? Now you are giving praise to Hitler??? I don't care if Hitler cured cancer, he was a piece of crap and a murderer! Where do you come up with this stuff?????

Ok again you are to stupid to decifer.. Back in the early 40's (and at the time) a caring leader went to Porche, asked them to deveolpe a car at a price that all germans could afford to drive..they did, it was the vw bug , ..SOON AFTER HE WENT NUTS AFTER REALIZING HIS POWER THEN DECIDED TO RULE THE WORLD...AGAIN ASSHOLE, I SAID JUST AS ANYONE WHO KNOWS HISTORY WILL TELL YOU HITLER BEGAN AS A DO-GOODER..I DID NOT PRAISE HITLER, HE TURNED INTO A TERRIBLE PERSON, I ONLY MENTIONED HOW THE VOLKSWAGON BECAME A CAR.. Where do I get this stuff you asked,, History.. Now would you like to hear why BMW is not allowed to make airplanes or the story behind Bavarian Motor Works?

 

[3 Card]

I gather that you are no longer an Elio Enthusiast.

The car and idea yes, the bs practice of the Elio Team, NO

 

[paddy's wagon]

Toyota, Walmart, McDonalds, HP, Intel didn't all start anywhere near the size they are now....

So why is it that Elio has to jump in at a HUGE sized factory and proposed huge vehicle-per-day production rate?

Wouldn't it have been easier all around to start with a Modest size and production rate, and go on from there? I understand the "economies of Scale" concept, but still......

Facebook and twitter, smart phones and all the tablets took off because there was a pent up market. Cars, not so much. But as gas nears $5.00 per gal then watch.

Maybe Elio does need to scale back it's start up ambitions. The factory space is more than adequate now that our "Mystry buyer of floor space" I mentioned in a previous post backed out.

Regards,

 

[Kuda]

The only reason is their goal of producing the vehicle for so little money, right now only $6800. The only way to achieve that number is via economies of scale. It's a bit ironic that if they start small to keep costs down the vehicle would actually still need to cost a good bit more.

The reality of most wiget businesses is that the first widget to roll of the line is the most expensive, in Elios case let's say 250mil, @ 1k profit, 250k Elios
later that one is really $6,800. The numbers may be off but the principle is right. They have to recoup start up costs, Marketing, & R&D, etc............

 

[Kuda]

We're floggin a dead horse here. The same arguments pro/con keep recycling themselves due to the anxiety over the wait, think I'll go fishin
& wait to see what happens since I can't really do much to change the status quo..............

 

[paddy's wagon]

If the $6.8 K figure is too low to start up production in today's world what would you be willing to pay to have an Elio and 49/84 MPG?

 

[Joshua Caldwell]

If the $6.8 K figure is too low to start up production in today's world what would you be willing to pay to have an Elio and 49/84 MPG?

I've budgeted $10k from my 401k and $3k from vehicle trade-in. I intend to spend on a nice paint job and options, but if goes towards the base model then I don't care as it would still be cheaper than the alternatives.