A huge milestone for the American electric vehicle and clean energy company, Tesla, as it has confirmed that it reached its goal of producing half a million EVs in 2020. Given that its factories weren’t running at full capacity at all times due to the pandemic, it is no mean feat considering there were only 367,500 deliveries in the year prior.
Tesla has become the largest car manufacturer by market capitalization (by far), even though the company is still very small in terms of car sales compared to more traditional manufacturers. The largest manufacturer in the United States is General Motors, who sold 7.1 million units in 2019. Toyota Motors sold more than 10 million cars in the same period.
The majority of the 509,737 Tesla cars came from its more affordable offerings in the form of the Model 3 and the Model Y. More than 450,000 cars of the total were form these two models, while only about 55,000 of them were the premium Model S and Model X models (only about 10.8 percent of the total). While Tesla may still be small in comparison with contemporaries, it is very much at the head of the field when it comes to EVs. For comparison, GM sold less than 20,000 Chevy Volts in 2020.
Electric vehicles are becoming more mainstream every year, so Tesla needs to continue its massive expansion efforts to stay ahead. It will open two more massive Gigafactory manufacturing plants in 2021, one in Berlin, Germany and another in Texas, USA. Tesla also plans to start manufacturing the Cybertruck sometime this year (most likely towards the tail end), and will be releasing a refreshed Model S design.
The company is also expecting its deliveries of Model Y crossovers to increase significantly in 2021 now that it is being manufactured in Shanghai. There is also talks of the much anticipated $25,000 Tesla, but we know that is still years away. The company needs to reach critical volume in order to manufacture a car at such a low price.
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