Tesla is looking to be building 1,000 examples of the Model 3 a week from its new Gigafactory 3 in Shanghai, China by the end of the year, Reuters reports.
Sources with knowledge of Tesla’s production plans for the new site assert that the factory will start churning out Model 3s later this month. Although they failed to provide an exact date, October 14 has been previously touted by suppliers.
“We aim to start some production in October, but the actual production volume depends on many factors including car orders we received, performance of newly hired workers, supply chain and so on,” a Tesla source said. “It’s unclear when we can reach the 1,000-2,000 units per week target.”
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Tesla’s first overseas manufacturing site which cost roughly $2 billion to build, received Chinese government approval last month and will start building Model 3s in the midst of the U.S.-China trade war and weakness in the Chinese car sector.
However, while the sales growth of new energy vehicles across the country is expected to slow this year, the automaker has enjoyed a 98 per cent bump in sales in the first seven months of the year on the back of strong demand for the entry-level Model 3.
Sources close to Tesla have revealed that Gigafactory 3 will also build battery packs and initially have a production capacity of 250,000 vehicles. This will later grow to 500,000 units when the second phase of construction at the site is completed.