On March 28th, due to the increasingly severe COVID-19 situation in Shanghai, the Tesla Gigafactory located in Lingang, Pudong, Shanghai was among the first batch of lockdown and cessation-of-production areas for approximately 23 days. Yesterday, under the collaboration of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Shanghai Municipal Government, and the Shanghai Municipal Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the automotive industry began to resume work and production in an orderly manner.
On April 17th to 18th, more than 8,000 Tesla Shanghai factory employees returned to work. Yesterday morning, the battery and electric motor workshops resumed normal production. As of now, multiple production lines have started to operate efficiently.
The senior director of manufacturing for Tesla’s Gigafactory, Song Gang, said, “We will gradually increase production capacity over the next three to four days until we reach full production.”
Currently, the Tesla Shanghai factory has Phase 1 and Phase 2; the normal production capacity under full operation is about 60,000 to 70,000 vehicles per month. During the more than 20 days of cessation-of-production, Tesla has lost approximately 40,000 units of production capacity, so the estimation is that this resumption will produce a higher production capacity for the Model Y line, with single-shift monthly capacity previously at around 25,000 units.
However, currently, Tesla’s inventory of materials can only support one week of production, so whether production can continue depends on suppliers’ ability to resume work and production within the next week.
Fortunately, according to Tesla’s manufacturing director in Shanghai, many Tesla parts suppliers in Shanghai have also begun to resume work. At the same time, Tesla suppliers in Zhejiang Province are gradually resuming production and logistics supply. Suppliers in Jiangsu Province are also actively recovering.
With the resumption of work and production, the nationwide sales and transportation network is expected to gradually open up. Not only Tesla, but also local automotive factories and component factories in Shanghai are gradually recovering production capacity to ensure the national automotive industry. Even during the pandemic, everyone will still be one step closer to their new car.
Source: Official Tesla News
This article is a translation by ChatGPT of a Chinese report from 42HOW. If you have any questions about it, please email bd@42how.com.