Tesla / Panasonic battery advancements

[Pushmi-Pullyu]

From the transcript of Tesla's quarterly (Q1 2018) conference call with investors, May 2, 2018:

Rod Lache - Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc.

...your comments in your letter on the advances in batteries were interesting. Could you give us some insight into how we can translate that into cost per kilowatt hour? Or some metric in terms of the gains that you're making?

Deepak Ahuja - Tesla, Inc.

Every data point, Rod, that we look at internally suggests that we are best-in-class, but we don't prefer to...

Elon Reeve Musk - Tesla, Inc.

We're best, which is not a class.

Deepak Ahuja - Tesla, Inc.

Yes. We're the best. Sorry.

Elon Reeve Musk - Tesla, Inc.

The best-in-class of one.

Jeffrey B. Straubel - Tesla, Inc.

I think directionally, Rod, it's helpful to understand the different commodities and the trends that we're pursuing in the batteries. Being on a path to reduce cobalt usage, for instance, has been something we've been working on for literally several years now, and this has been extremely helpful in the overall cost per kilowatt hour, especially with recent commodity price movements. So, we can't really be quantitative, but that directionally is a pretty good trend.

Elon Reeve Musk - Tesla, Inc.

Yeah, we think we can get the cobalt to almost nothing.
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(Source: Seeking Alpha)
https://seekingalpha.com/article/41...-results-earnings-call-transcript?part=single

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The InsideEVs New site now has an article on that:

"Tesla Panasonic Quietly Outmaneuver All Lithium Battery Manufacturers"

Unfortunately the article isn't set up to allow comments. So I've created this discussion thread for the subject.

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[Pushmi-Pullyu]

If I read this right, Tesla is suggesting it has the lowest cost per kWh for batteries in the industry.

Specifically, responding to a question about "cost per kilowatt hour", Tesla's CFO, Deepak Ahuja, said:

Every data point, Rod, that we look at internally suggests that we are best-in-class...
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Of course that's not proof, and in fact Ahuja's answer suggests that Tesla doesn't know the exact prices other EV makers are paying battery makers. That isn't too surprising, since that information is held as trade secrets by the companies involved... including Tesla.

But I find the question interesting, because it seemed just a very few years ago that LG Chem was advertising the lowest cost per kWh for the type of batteries being used in EVs, yet others have suggested that the price Tesla is paying Panasonic is even lower. I don't regard this as a settled point, but it certainly does refute the suggestion by one fool cell fanboy on this forum that advancements in li-ion batteries have stalled out!

Go Tesla! (...and Go Panasonic!)

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