Asger Risom
A decade after Tesla upended the auto market, traditional carmakers are still struggling with the part of the business that made the company unstoppable.
A decade after Tesla upended the auto market, traditional carmakers are still struggling with the part of the business that made the company unstoppable. They can build good electric vehicles — some great ones — but the full experience remains out of reach.
That gap becomes painfully clear the moment an EV leaves the driveway and enters the real world.
End-to-end thinking
Tesla’s 2012 launch of the Model S marked a turning point. The company had been around for years, but that was when its thesis finally crystallized: an all-electric sedan built from scratch, creating a segment that barely existed and wiping out assumptions about what an EV could be.
The years that followed saw Tesla refine that formula. According to reporting from multiple outlets, its lineup has at different times become the world’s best-selling luxury sedan, premium vehicle and top-selling EV. Its market valuation rivals the rest of the auto industry combined.
Yet the major global automakers — often labeled “legacy” brands — still haven’t matched the one thing Tesla built early: a holistic system where the hardware, software and infrastructure belong to the same ecosystem.
The full stack
On a recent 650-mile drive in a 2025 Hyundai Ioniq 5 XRT, I found what many reviewers have noted: Hyundai builds one of the strongest EVs offered by a traditional manufacturer in the U.S. market. But the company does not yet control the elements that make the experience seamless.
Tesla does. Its charging network remains more reliable, more accessible and generally cheaper than alternatives. Its sales model avoids dealer markups and finance pressure. Its cars tie smoothly into home charging, solar systems and energy storage. Even hotel chargers tend to carry the Tesla logo.
This broad integration turns EVs into rolling power hubs. The more services that link to the battery, the more value a manufacturer can extract.
A fragmented trip
Hyundai hopes to build that kind of platform, but it remains one division within a giant conglomerate. It has the scale and resources, yet its software, energy services and infrastructure are still developing. For now, the cars are excellent — the ecosystem around them is not.
Planning the trip underscored the problem. I skipped Hyundai’s built-in route planner and turned instead to A Better Routeplanner, a tool now owned by Rivian, which builds much of its own system. Because the app wasn’t designed by Hyundai and the XRT is new, it couldn’t accurately predict real-world efficiency. And without direct integration into the vehicle, it couldn’t update plans automatically.
Tesla drivers don’t think about any of this. The system calculates routes, knows battery behavior and uses only Superchargers — still the most consistent network in North America.
Charging challenges
Hyundai fans may point out that the 2025 Ioniq 5 includes the Tesla-style NACS plug. In theory, that closes the gap. In practice, it didn’t.
The first two Superchargers I tried refused to initiate charging. Attempts through the Tesla app and plug-and-charge failed. Because the Supercharger network was built for Tesla’s own back-end systems, third-party faults are difficult to diagnose. After standard troubleshooting from Hyundai didn’t help, I switched to a Rivian charger, using yet another adapter.
On the return leg, I tried Hyundai’s own planner. It directed me to a single-stall CalTrans charger in the Mojave desert that had been closed for months and operated at a fraction of the car’s maximum charging speed. The nearest functional charger was 25 miles away, and battery efficiency was falling. Following the guidance could have left me stranded.
A well-engineered EV means little if the route and charging tools can’t be trusted.
A long climb
Executives from Hyundai, General Motors and Ford often argue that they shouldn’t be judged by charging infrastructure, noting legacy brands never built gas stations. Why should EV makers suddenly have to build energy networks?
Because EVs aren’t gas cars. They create new revenue streams and new control points. Automakers don’t have to build chargers, home batteries and integrated energy systems — but they benefit enormously if they do. Electricity will power more of the world’s work, and the companies that manage that flow will control the business.
Tesla made that investment early, at great cost. Most established automakers didn’t. Some — including Honda, Toyota and Stellantis — have barely begun.
Slow progress
Among the legacy brands, General Motors appears furthest along. Reporting from U.S. outlets notes that GM has a mature EV platform, cohesive software, reliable Google-powered routing, a home-energy product line, partnerships with EVGo, investment in the Ionna charging network and a strong supply chain. It has recently expanded into home energy and robotics.
Other manufacturers — including Mercedes, BMW, Kia, Hyundai and Stellantis — hold stakes in Ionna or are pursuing their own charging solutions. But none approach Tesla’s scale, and drivers notice.
Tesla had the luxury of losing billions to make the model viable. Legacy companies must fund EV transformation while still relying on gasoline vehicles to stay profitable.
Two incompatible models
That tension explains the core challenge. A company optimized for combustion vehicles cannot easily pivot to an ecosystem built around software, energy management and continuous connectivity.
It raises questions traditional automakers still struggle to answer:
How do you reduce costs when systems must support gasoline platforms?
How do you push seamless over-the-air updates when many models can’t install them?
How do you sell a $50,000 EV without software that can route it reliably across the country?
Maybe the legacy brands will find a workaround. They can keep producing “good-enough” EVs while infrastructure improves and lessons accumulate. But the longer they wait, the harder it becomes to catch a company that built the future more than a decade ago.
Sources: Insideevs
This article is made and published by Asger Risom, who may have used AI in the preparation
