Revenge 245
leaders in the world and a company I personally have long
admired,” Elon told the audience of the press conference
where the collaboration was announced. The next on the
stage was Toyoda himself. “Mr. Musk kindly gave me the
opportunity to drive one of Tesla’s electric vehicle,” he said.
“Not only was I impressed by Tesla’s technology, but I also
felt their energy seeing that they made their vehicle in an
extremely short time. I felt the wind - the wind of the
future. While driving I talked with Mr. Musk and again
I was moved by his dedication to Toyota’s approach to
making things.”^448
It may first sound like it’s the wrong strategy to sell
Tesla’s technology to other car manufactures when Tesla
could sell the cars themselves. But you can’t compare
Tesla’s existing cars with the RAV4 EV or the Smart.^225
Tesla’s strategy is similar to the strategy used by Apple.
What Apple did was to make sure their software in the
competing products didn’t compete with Apple’s products.
Apple wanted others to use their technology to see how
great it is. The media library and store iTunes used to be
exclusively for Apple computers, but Apple decided to let
Windows users install iTunes, and the rest is history. How
many people use iTunes today?^238
“Over time my focus has shifted from engineering,
which is kind of my intrinsic forte, to supply chain, pro-
duction and now service to make sure that people have
a really great experience,” Elon said. “It’s not my natural