If one mentally redefines what a &quot;car&quot; will become, it can inform (and also mislead) predictions.<p>Several industry writers have jokingly observed that a car like Tesla is really a &quot;laptop with wheels&quot;.<p>If we extend that reframing to say that future cars are really &quot;robots with wheels&quot;, it doesn&#x27;t look so preposterous that Tesla, Google[1], and Apple (rumoured self-driving car) could dominate Ford, GM, Toyota, etc.  It seems possible that a 75% or more of a future car&#x27;s R&amp;D costs will be the sensors + computer algorithms + petabytes of cloud data integration instead of things like the tires, paint formulations, suspensions, etc.<p>To riff on a phrase from CEO Reed Hastings, <i>&quot;The Goal Is to Become HBO Faster Than HBO Can Become Us&quot;</i> ... it seems reasonable for Tesla&#x2F;Google&#x2F;Apple to acquire competencies in assembling chassis with wheels faster than Ford&#x2F;GM&#x2F;Toyota to acquire competitive knowledge in robotics+algorithms.  Time will tell.<p>[1] robotics company acquired by Google:  <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;user&#x2F;BostonDynamics" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;user&#x2F;BostonDynamics</a>