Tesla Release All Of Their Patents - All Of Them

Zillah · 12-06-2014 11:03PM #1

This is Elon Musk:

If you haven't heard of him, you've certainly heard of what he has done. He co-founded PayPal, and thereby revolutionised how commerce on the internet works. He got bored of that, and sold his shares and went on to make another company.

That company is Space X. The first non-governmental space company that is so good they won the contract to supply the International Space Station. They do stuff like make rockets that can take off and land again, vertically:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxKWh7kLDzw
(no, that's not CGI, regardless of what your instincts might tell you)

He then decided he wanted to revolutionise another industry, and founded the Tesla electric car company. They made electric cars sexy, releasing the first electric sports car, and now make a few different models of absolutely beautiful electric cars.

When you buy one, you get free electricity from their top up stations, for life (none here yet, but a ton of them in US). To pull this off they developed a ton of new technology to make electric cars match and in some cases out-perform petrol cars.

They decided, however, that they were never going to fix the climate on their own, they can't make cars fast enough. So they've released their patents. Anyone, anywhere, is allowed to use Tesla technology to build electric cars, for free.

Announcement here:
http://www.teslamotors.com/blog/all-our-patent-are-belong-you

This guy is my hero. He's also a billionaire who went drinking in Coppers when he was over for a conference.

(sorry if this is a little long, the pictures would break it up a lot more if I could imbed them)

fergiesfolly · 12-06-2014 11:12PM

He's like an antithesis to Steve Jobs

nibtrix · 12-06-2014 11:17PM

The best review of a car ever - http://theoatmeal.com/comics/tesla_model_s

Also, Elon Musk agreed to help pay for the Tesla Museum...

wretcheddomain · 12-06-2014 11:22PM

His name sounds suspiciously like a brand of perfume. Next revolutionary area maybe?

TimeToShine · 12-06-2014 11:25PM

They hope that electric cars become standard - so they can lead the way.

A very nice gesture but don't think it's unmotivated by business.

Holsten · 12-06-2014 11:27PM

Cool, never knew about him.

What a man!

Sh1tbag OToole · 12-06-2014 11:30PM

Saw a tesla roadster in cork there a few weeks ago on the road to skibbereen. Fine piece of machine it was, shame they discontinued the roadster, the Model S is just too boring and civilised and luxurious for my liking.. not that i can afford either

Zillah · 12-06-2014 11:33PM

nibtrix wrote: »

The best review of a car ever - http://theoatmeal.com/comics/tesla_model_s

Oh man I had forgotten about this, it's amazing.
Awarded 5.4 out of 5 for safety. They broke the system.

TimeToShine wrote: »

They hope that electric cars become standard - so they can lead the way.

A very nice gesture but don't think it's unmotivated by business.

I'm sure they did some analysis and decided they would probably benefit from electric cars taking off generally, but still, what other company would take such a gamble? They have the market cornered, they've done things with electric cars no one else has gotten close too. Normal business practice would be to brutally throttle competition, even selling at a loss to drive competitors out of business for long-term gain. They're doing the opposite. They're trying to foster competition and spark the industry for long term gain for all concerned.

I struggle to be even a little bit cynical about it.

RustyNut · 12-06-2014 11:37PM

Hmm an open source car and a 3d printer. I wonder.......:pac:

caustic 1 · 12-06-2014 11:38PM

Nice teeth.

12-06-2014 11:47PM

Technology leadership is not defined by patents, which history has repeatedly shown to be small protection indeed against a determined competitor, but rather by the ability of a company to attract and motivate the world’s most talented engineers. We believe that applying the open source philosophy to our patents will strengthen rather than diminish Tesla’s position in this regard.

It's really interesting to see this development: opening things up to the market really does benefit people, not patents.

PizzamanIRL · 12-06-2014 11:48PM

He has 7 wrinkles around his right eye.

caustic 1 · 12-06-2014 11:51PM

PizzamanIRL wrote: »

He has 7 wrinkles around his right eye.

Anti-aging cream should be his next venture.

Mr. Incognito · 13-06-2014 12:03AM

A wonderful gesture.

Kudos to him

Lou.m · 13-06-2014 12:04AM

Zillah wrote: »

This is Elon Musk:

If you haven't heard of him, you've certainly heard of what he has done. He co-founded PayPal, and thereby revolutionised how commerce on the internet works. He got bored of that, and sold his shares and went on to make another company.

That company is Space X. The first non-governmental space company that is so good they won the contract to supply the International Space Station. They do stuff like make rockets that can take off and land again, vertically:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxKWh7kLDzw
(no, that's not CGI, regardless of what your instincts might tell you)

He then decided he wanted to revolutionise another industry, and founded the Tesla electric car company. They made electric cars sexy, releasing the first electric sports car, and now make a few different models of absolutely beautiful electric cars.

When you buy one, you get free electricity from their top up stations, for life (none here yet, but a ton of them in US). To pull this off they developed a ton of new technology to make electric cars match and in some cases out-perform petrol cars.

They decided, however, that they were never going to fix the climate on their own, they can't make cars fast enough. So they've released their patents. Anyone, anywhere, is allowed to use Tesla technology to build electric cars, for free.

Announcement here:
http://www.teslamotors.com/blog/all-our-patent-are-belong-you

This guy is my hero. He's also a billionaire who went drinking in Coppers when he was over for a conference.

(sorry if this is a little long, the pictures would break it up a lot more if I could imbed them)

I know I read this it's AMAZING! HE IS AMAZING!

Lou.m · 13-06-2014 12:06AM

Tesla himself was a humanist in the same vain ..he would have surely approved!

Soups123 · 13-06-2014 12:07AM

Ok so he doesn't run a mental hospital and hasn't released all it's patients.

I need to read titles more carefully!

Jimoslimos · 13-06-2014 12:10AM

Nice enough gesture but I don't think there's anything particularly ground-breaking in those patents anyway. It's basically a load of lithium-ion batteries (like you'd get in a laptop) hooked up to a powertrain to drive the wheels.

Obviously Tesla would prefer electric car development would stay along those lines (with better battery tech) rather than say hydrogen fuel cells.

EyeSight · 13-06-2014 12:14AM

Jimoslimos wrote: »

Nice enough gesture but I don't think there's anything particularly ground-breaking in those patents anyway. It's basically a load of lithium-ion batteries (like you'd get in a laptop) hooked up to a powertrain to drive the wheels.

Obviously Tesla would prefer electric car development would stay along those lines (with better battery tech) rather than say hydrogen fuel cells.

Maybe not but now other companies can use the same technology. They don't need to find a different way to do the same thing, spend years designing, building and testing. It's all done and ready for them to use

YFlyer · 13-06-2014 12:14AM

Soups123 wrote: »

Ok so he doesn't run a mental hospital and hasn't released all it's patients.

I need to read titles more carefully!

During a full moon.

whirlpool · 13-06-2014 12:17AM

Rockets taking off vertically? Um... don't all rockets do that?

Jimoslimos · 13-06-2014 12:20AM

whirlpool wrote: »

Rockets taking off vertically? Um... don't all rockets do that?

Did you watch the landing as well?

ScumLord · 13-06-2014 12:26AM

Jimoslimos wrote: »

Nice enough gesture but I don't think there's anything particularly ground-breaking in those patents anyway. It's basically a load of lithium-ion batteries (like you'd get in a laptop) hooked up to a powertrain to drive the wheels.

They did have a secret method for charging and using the batteries, they reckoned they could get ten years out of the battery pack which is pretty incredible.

RobertKK · 13-06-2014 12:32AM

Elon Musk is the man that replaced Steve Jobs in the hero worship category. They love him on the business news channels.

Tesla had a phenomenal year - its share price went from $30 to $264 a share, now just over $200 a share.
The $5 billion gigafactory will produce the batteries needed for the cars and maybe even home storage of electricity. Musk is also the chairman of Solar City a solar power company, and they tested using solar power and storing the excess power in batteries and using that instead of power from the grid.

Tesla cars are expensive, the cheaper models in the future will be the driving force (pardon the pun) for Tesla, they will be like apple in the phone market.

anncoates · 13-06-2014 12:55AM

Are they just testing out theories?

brandon_flowers · 13-06-2014 12:04PM

PizzamanIRL wrote: »

He has 7 wrinkles around his right eye.

A face Musk every night would clear that up in no time.

*leaves coat behind in hurry

wes · 13-06-2014 12:44PM

Wow, very rare for a company to release patents like, and it will hopefully spur innovation with electric cars.

SEPT 23 1989 · 13-06-2014 12:50PM

Wheres the catch? there is always a catch

ScumLord · 13-06-2014 12:56PM

anncoates wrote: »

Are they just testing out theories?

How do you mean? The companies are all growing concerns, the electric car patents all work and the cars are on sale in the US.

I suppose it could be a savy marketing move. It's often said that a patent cost as much as you're willing to spend defending it. Maybe they knew they'd be at the mercy of patent challenges from bigger companies and decided to avoid all that while looking like heroes. Although I'd say the bigger manufacturers are probably too far down their own development paths to start again with tesla's technology.

It could be a serious boost to smaller producers though.

brandon_flowers · 13-06-2014 01:05PM

Intellectual property has the shelf life of a banana as Bill Gates once said. But only in a high tech, large scale fast selling industry.

Probable catch is that Tesla has a whole batch of new patents ready for submission, they do employ the best and most innovative people and the most innovative engineers are better than any patents. If you are constantly improving on your old stuff then those patents are worthless.

Patents are valuable in things like huge turnkey designs like a floating oil rig or a TGV which takes years to design and a good patent is worth defending. For mass production they are almost worthless, even Samsung weren't penalized financially overall in the case taken by Apple. They made far more profit from what they sold than the $120m fine would cover.

Akrasia · 13-06-2014 01:22PM

Elon Musk is an absolute legend.

He's basically Tony Stark and I'm 100% convinced he has his own fully functioning Iron Man suit somewhere in development

Tesla Release All Of Their Patents - All Of Them

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