Tom Friedman of The New York Times isn’t done pummeling Detroit auto companies. In his Dec. 9 column, “While Detroit Slept,” he compares the idea of a Detroit bailout to investing billions of dollars to save the music CD business with the advent of the iPod and iTunes.
His argument focuses on the need to innovate rather than isolate.
To illustrate his point, Friedman writes about Better Place, an electric car startup based in Palo Alto, California.
Better Place’s idea is to offer an electric car infrastructure that includes charging points, battery change stations and software that automates it.
“Founded in October 2007 with $200 million in venture funding, Better Place builds networks of electric vehicles powered by renewable energy,” according to a Better Place press release. “Currently, the company is working with partners to build electric vehicle infrastructure in Israel, Denmark, Australia and the United States.”
If fortune favors the bold, Better Place may be the recipient. His vision is nothing short of bold.
“Better Place is committed to providing transportation as a sustainable service by eradicating the need for oil as a fuel source and migrating to renewable energy,” according to the Better Place website. “By harnessing power from resources such as wind, solar power and other carbon-free sources, transportation becomes part of a self-sustaining infrastructure that not only reduces the financial impact of our oil addiction, but also improves and protects our environment and our health.
When did you hear a CEO of the Big Three auto companies seize the high ground and inspire us with a vision like that?
Instead, GM’s current thinking has been more like staying in the same old place rather than taking us to a better one.
“GM Vice President Bob Lutz … has been quoted as saying that hybrids like the Toyota Prius ‘don’t make economic sense,'” Friedman writes. And, in February, he was quoted by Dallas D magazine as saying that global warming “is total nonsense.” [expletive],” according to Friedman in his Nov. 11 column.
Why not be bold? Bold action can spur success from unexpected sources.
In the early 1970s, Intel reluctantly entered the microprocessor business. The company was already making memory chips and was struggling to meet demand.
But Robert Noyce, the founder of Intel, instinctively understood the enormous potential of the multifunction microprocessor and urged his managers to develop it.
The businessman faces a dilemma. He never knows if his vision of today will be relevant tomorrow.
The very fact that entrepreneurs keep going despite the unknown suggests that the unknown itself is part of the adventure.
The life-threatening dilemma facing Detroit automakers today suggests that the bold visions, the long shots, the DNA of corporate life, have been removed from the culture.
Friedman uses Better Place to suggest that anyone with entrepreneurial guts can seize the moment and start an entirely new way of doing things. And Better Place founder Shai Agassi has done just that.
His “company is focused on one of the biggest challenges of this century: building a scalable and sustainable personal transportation system that ends dependence on oil,” according to the Better Place website.
Agassi’s vision, if successful, is not only very promising. Like the iPod and iTunes did to the music CD business, his vision could completely change the auto industry. No wonder Friedman titled his article, “While Detroit Slept.”
“Don’t expect this innovation to come out of Detroit,” Friedman said. “Remember, in 1908, the Ford Model-T got better mileage, 25 miles per gallon, than many Ford, GM and Chrysler models made in 2008. But don’t be surprised when it comes from somewhere else. It can be done. It will be done. “
Knowledge and innovation are like mercury.
These days, innovation can happen anywhere, not just in places like Detroit, where the once-invincible General Motors set the pace for consumer car innovation.
“If you have an idea in Detroit or Tennessee,” Friedman writes, “promise me you’ll pursue it, because someone in Denmark or Tel Aviv will a second later.”
No one has a lock on new ideas. And, due to globalization and the success of the Internet, it’s easier than ever to get new ideas off the ground. We don’t have to wait for once-great companies like GM to issue edicts.
Instead of innovating, they isolated; and now they are dying.
“Under the Better Place model,” Friedman writes, “consumers can buy or lease an electric car from French automaker Renault or Japanese companies like Nissan (General Motors snubbed Agassi) and then buy miles on their car batteries.” He buys an Apple cell phone and AT&T minutes. That way Better Place, or any car company that partners with it, profits from every mile he drives. GM sells cars. Better Place sells miles of mobility,” Friedman said.
