It was barely an Elise by the time they shipped. So many changes were needed, that they said they'd have been far better off starting fresh, which is what they did with the S.
I don't think that would've been better. It gave them a good start for a POC/MVP.
It's the same as some people who say "next startup, I'll go straight to insert scalable architecture". That doesn't work. You need your flexibility to experiment and find what really works in the beginning.
