Tesla ships first electric cars overseas since lockdown halted Shanghai production, as domestic sales dwindle to a trickle
- Some 4,767 EVs built at the Gigafactory 3 left for Slovenia on Wednesday, according to Jiefang Daily
- The plant suspended production between March 28 and April 18 as Shanghai doubled down on curbs to prevent the spread of the Omicron variant
That was a mere 2 per cent of its sales in the previous month, before Shanghai went into lockdown, forcing thousands of manufacturers to down tools.
The Gigafactory 3, also known as Giga Shanghai, suspended production between March 28 and April 18 as Shanghai, the epicentre of the mainland’s latest Covid-19 outbreak, doubled down on pandemic curbs to prevent the spread of the Omicron variant.
The factory restarted production on April 19, three days after the Shanghai government published a “white list” allowing 666 key manufacturers to operate under a so-called closed loop system – workers essentially sleeping on site to avoid contact with outsiders.
Giga Shanghai churned out 10,757 vehicles in April, according to data from the China Passenger Car Association (CPCA).
The factory was only able to run a single shift initially because of a shortage of components, which limited output to about 1,000 vehicles a day – about half the plant’s normal daily output.
The lockdown in Shanghai benefited Tesla’s three Chinese rivals – Xpeng, Nio and Li Auto. Their deliveries beat the US giant for the first time since January 2020, even as their own sales declined because of a strained supply chain.
Guangzhou’s Xpeng delivered 9,002 electric cars last month, 41.6 per cent fewer than a month earlier.
Giga Shanghai said before the lockdown that it aimed to ship 300,000 vehicles to foreign markets including Japan and Germany this year after it delivered 163,000 units to customers outside the mainland in 2021.
The Shanghai factory reported a total output of 484,130 vehicles in 2021, just over half of its global deliveries.
Early this week, logistics issues arising from the lockdown caused Giga Shanghai to suspend part of its operations.
Shanghai has yet to unveil a time frame for lifting the citywide lockdown that started on April 1.