The contrast between Tesla and the rest of the auto industry is terrifying (TSLA, GM, F, FCAU, RACE)

As it turns out, Marchionne is also CEO of Ferrari, but the contrast between the Italian carmaker and Tesla owes more to the similarity between the companies than to leadership differences.

Ferrari, like Tesla, is a brand built on a story, and for Ferrari, that story is racing. Yes, Ferrari has sold plenty of road cars since the middle of the 20th century, and it has sold them for a lot of money. But at its core, Ferrari is about winning Formula One races.

That mission has been pursued with absolute concentration. The F1 car for a given year is, ultimately, the only Ferrari that really matters. There is no business case for the expensive road cars without it.

Tesla, on the other hand, has a Ferrari-like portfolio of vehicles, in terms of size (just three cars currently coming out of the Tesla factory, versus five for Ferrari). There’s also a vision, although unlike Ferrari it isn’t predicated on winning races. Rather, it’s Musk’s desire to hasten humanity’s exit from the fossil-fuel era and to mitigate global warming.

Tesla, unfortunately, isn’t modeling itself on Ferrari, which would actually be logical. Instead, it’s aiming to become GM or Toyota, producing cars at a gigantic scale. Tesla’s core business — luxury vehicles — shares Ferrari’s sexiness and preoccupation with performance.

It’s larger, of course — Ferrari sells less than 10,000 cars per year — but Teslas are also far less expensive. An entry-level Tesla luxury vehicle is under $100,000, while the cheapest Ferrari is $200,000.

Musk would obviously like to be half Ferrari-half GM, but this is an impossible circle to square. The tragedy is that as Ferrari talks about going electric, Tesla is already there. The problem is that the CEO simply can’t accept that destiny.