https://corporate.walmart.com/newsro...lmart-delivers
They say that each driver logs over 100,000 annually, so they should have [almost 7,000 drivers [and semis]].
https://www.fleetowner.com/fleet-man...losing-the-gap
Let's stick with 100,000 miles annually and 7,000 semis and drivers. The second source does not necessarily apply to the first, that would indicate that the trucks drive with a trailer less than 20% of the time. We lost our resident trucker, so I cannot ask him, but I will just use this information.
7,000 semis need two drive tires almost every year, eight drive tires almost every four years, and eight trailer tires every year. 7,000 x (2 + 8/4 + 8) = 7,000 x 12.
Walmart may go through 84,000 tires a year, or 1/2,000th of what this kid who, for one, welcomes our new Tesla overlord.
"At the end of 2019, Tesla's global sales since 2012 totaled over 891,000 units."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla,_Inc.
I cannot find any numbers for January, but their goal is 500,000 vehicles this year, If they achieved that for January, they would have sold 41,667, which would put them around 933,000 to date.
To go from less than a million cars in seven or eight years to 20,000,000 robotaxis sounds ridiculous. Musk says they will have the technology by the end of the year, but how many targets has he made?
If Musk sells 100,000 robotaxis in 2021, almost 25% of his total sales in his best year to date, and he increased robotaxi production 62.09% a year, and every single robotaxi was on the road in 2030(!), there would be 20,001,266 of them, and the oldest ones might have a million miles.
This would involve selling over 1.1 million in 2026 and 7.7 million in 2030. Is that possible? How am I supposed to know?! Am I Hari Seldon?!
I do not have any idea how big the largest taxi fleet is. Google insists that it is Uber, but they are not taxis. What is the biggest fleet of taxis owned by the company?
I do not have any idea how to compare $50,000 Teslas and $200,000+ semis, but it is entirely possible that Tesla will own robotaxis worth more than Walmart's entire fleet, and maybe it would make sense to buy a tire company, but you had better believe that they would receive a bulk discount first.
It would also make sense to use smaller than 20" wheels. Didn't Jason of Engineering Explained say his 18" wheels were half the cost of 20" tires?