Kinda late to the game with this, but Tesla has officially filed an S-1 which means it will probably IPO sometime in Fall 2010.

Just wanted to share, cause you know, I’m right.

• Tesla expects to raise $100M
• Law firm WSGR is running the show
• Some heavy (and hungry no doubt) ibanks participating include: JPM, GS, MS, Deutsche
• In 2008, net loss of $83M
• PwC is auditor (not surprising, the only other alt. would be EY considering Silicon Valley presence)

Question is: would you want to be an investor? and why?

I just made a purchase for a set of new Bose Triport replacement cushions using Bill Me Later. This was my first time using it and it was surprisingly easy: just fill in your address, birth date and last four digits of your social. In a matter of seconds, you find out whether or not you can make the purchase on credit. I’m not really sure how I get an invoice and pay for it, so I’ll post an update on that shortly. The apparent technology with BML is interesting because it doesn’t require you to enter your full SSN, unlike say a credit card application, and instead uses a variety of known factors like your address and birth date to figure out who you are and consequently, your credit allowance.

BML was acquired by eBay in late 2008 for approx. $820M in cash and many large corporations have begun to roll it out as an alternative payment option alongside the usual Mastercard, Visa and PayPal.

Update: I registered an account with BML and it was as simple as purchasing my payment (SSN, and DOB). Afterwards, it asked me for my bank checking account number, which I was hesitant on providing, and noticed at the bottom of the page was a “skip this step” which I clicked on. I’m still not sure how I will be paying for this (e.g. check, CC?).

Update 2: Reader TJ points out the following,

The answer is, if you don’t register a checking account, there’s a physical address you can send payment to when it is due.  The address will be printed on your statement, just like any other bill.  You can also link your BML account to Paypal, and pay that way.

Upon closer inspection of the BML website, I’ve noticed they do indeed accept PayPal as a payment to settle the balance. Which raises the point… what’s the “value add” of BML if I can use PayPal (e.g. bank or CC) to pay my online purchases? Just seems like another unnecessary middleman.

Last month, when Google engineers at their sprawling campus in Silicon Valley began to suspect that Chinese intruders were breaking into private Gmail accounts, the company began a secret counteroffensive.

It managed to gain access to a computer in Taiwan that it suspected of being the source of the attacks. Peering inside that machine, company engineers actually saw evidence of the aftermath of the attacks, not only at Google, but also at at least 33 other companies, including Adobe Systems, Northrop Grumman and Juniper Networks, according to a government consultant who has spoken with the investigators.

Source: NY Times

Talk about sophistication. Google was able to “counterhack” the Chinese hacker’s operations. What kind of offensive is that if Google, a civilian institution, was capable of apparently hacking and collecting data of a supposedly well connected, pseudo government entity?

I just found out ABC 7 – the local news network here in the SF Bay area – offers free live streaming of their daily news. If you don’t have a TV, or like me, don’t like spoiling your brain with garbage, this is pretty cool. [Link to live stream]. The other local news sites I get my daily fill are SF Gate (the online version of the SF Chronicle) and Mercury News (mostly focuses on South Bay).

The fight has started. There are reports that Microsoft is in talks with NewCorp to ban Google from indexing WSJ’s content but Google isn’t flinching. In fact, Google’s standing their ground saying they don’t need content from WSJ to survive. Ha! Wait until other news sites — and later, blogs and other content providers — start blocking them in exchange for a slice of their billions of cash reserve.

This could be good news for Microsoft if they spin it right. Having searchable content from WSJ and, I expect in the future, other news sites like BBC, LA Times, NY Times could evolve it into a powerful content search engine. Nowadays, it’s easy for anyone to start a blog (like this one) and write about anything without credentials and consequences, but if Bing can search through trustworthy news sites, it can leverage that position as a-go-to news source. Sort of like a Wikipedia for news.

See my earlier post: Having Google Pay for Your Content

Yes, I know my Paintbrush skills are a big fat FAIL

If you’re living in Silicon Valley / South Bay, one thing you should find out right away is where your nearest Caltrain station is [Google Maps link]. The fare price is based on zones, so from San Jose station to San Francisco round trip is $15.50 at the time this post was published. If you’re traveling alone, it makes financial sense to take the Caltrain because parking in the City is about $20, plus you can take a nap on the train. The downside of taking the train is that it takes a long ass time to get to SF — about 1.5 hours in off peak hours or an hour during rush hour’s “Baby Bullet” schedule. When I’m visiting the City, I usually go from San Jose to Millbrae then take the Bart [Google Maps link] to either Montgomery, Embarcadero or Powell Station – this route, too, takes about 1.5 hours total.

However, you can save some coin by purchasing an 8 ticket pass or a monthly pass. I’m not sure what the discount percentages are, but for an 8 trip ticket from San Jose to San Francisco, it cost me $42.50 or about $10.50 round trip. Another thing to factor in is the cost of parking. Unfortunately, it’s not free and the accountants for Caltrain decided to increase the fee from $2 to $3 recently so don’t forget to tack on that extra fee when traveling the train. I’ve taken Caltrain fairly often and only encountered an issue once during off peak hours when the train was disabled due to “technical issues” and we had to wait for the next train. Good thing I wasn’t in a hurry or I’d be in trouble because we were stuck near Sunnyvale and I parked at San Jose.

Overall, I would say if you’re a daily commuter traveling along the route served by Caltrain, I would highly recommend using their services during rush hour as their service is spot on. People are friendly and clean, unlike San Francisco’s Bart or MUNI (no offense). I’d be interested in hearing your experience in using Caltrain whether it was a pleasant or not.

Don’t forget to bookmark Caltrain’s schedule here.

Reuters is reporting two uncited sources that Tesla Motors – best known for their electric sports car – is planning to file S-1 IPO documents “any day” now. I’ve seen the cars in person and it’s an amazing piece of engineering. In fact, I’ve seen it go from 0 to whoknowshowfast on Hwy 280 just outside of their Menlo Park dealership and it’s a speed demon: super silent, super fast and super expensive. The base price for the only model they ship starts at $109,000 and Tesla plans on introducing a $50,000 model sometime in 2011. Over the summer, Tesla moved from their old San Carlos office into a new office space in Palo Alto which will enable them to hire more people and grow. Also, the government – as part of their promotion of green/clean tech – granted Tesla a loan of $465 million this was in addition to GM’s $50 million investment in exchange for a 9% stake valuing the electric motor company at $550 million.

I’m not really sure why Tesla Motors would be looking for an IPO exit so  soon considering they were profitable as recent as July in addition to the cash infusions by the U.S. government and investors. They aren’t hurting for cash and they have plans to expand to other markets including Toronto, London (UK) and other various metropolitan cities. As such, I doubt Tesla will be filing IPO papers any time soon and wouldn’t expect to see them listed until their second model that sells for $50,000 ships to the public.

What you’ll get:
Free drinks-galore, Ruby puzzles (premium beverages rewarded for solving, of course), light bites, and a chance to meet the team. Plus, we’re hiring Ruby Developers…

Who we are:
We’re Shop It To Me – a rapidly-growing, profitable startup located in the heart of San Francisco’s SOMA district (a central spot on the Crawl, so mark your maps!). Tech Journalist Sarah Lacy called us the “Twitter of personal shopping sites”.

What we do:
We satisfy millions of subscribers daily (both men & women!), sending personalized “Salemail” alerts to help them meet all of their shopping needs.

Where we are:
340 Brannan Street (Between 2nd and 3rd).

Oh, and did we mention we’re hiring Ruby Developers?

See you soon!
www.shopittome.com/jobs

350 Brannan, Third Floor. Take the elevator. Very close to CalTrain and South Park. (Please bring your ID; we’ll be checking.)

Our vision is to connect people with the communities they care about. We are the online place where communities connect and thrive.

Get under the BigTent! We code in PHP (but love Ruby coders, too), play Wii, and are excited to welcome our guest star, Rockband.

Office Space will be playing ironically in the background. Don’t beat up any of our printers, but try to beat us in a giant game of PBR Beirut!

Crawl goes from 5:30 – 10:30, but if you get here early enough you might get to meet our mascot and ace coder, Ein.

See you tonight!