Tesla Migrates Shanghai Factory Workers To Boost US Plant Production

Tesla Inc TSLA sent engineers and production staff from its recently upgraded Shanghai factory to its plant in Fremont, California, to boost production at the U.S. facility, Bloomberg reports.

The Elon Musk-led carmaker will dispatch staff, particularly automation and control engineers, to assist efforts to increase output in Fremont, where Tesla produces the Model S, X, 3, and Y vehicles. 

About 200 people will head to California on assignments that will last at least three months. The first workers will set off by November.

Tesla delivered a record 83,135 cars in China in September after boosting the capacity of its Shanghai factory.

Upgrading the company’s first plant outside of the U.S. helped double the factory’s annual capacity to around 1 million vehicles.

Fremont can produce about 650,000 cars a year.

The uptick in production has shortened wait times for a Tesla in China to one to four weeks from a peak of 22 weeks earlier this year.

By comparison, customers ordering a Model Y sport utility vehicle in the U.S. may have to wait until April 2023 for delivery.

“There weren’t enough boats, there weren’t enough trains, there weren’t enough car carriers to actually support the wave” of vehicle deliveries at the end of the last quarter, Musk said during Tesla’s earnings call.

Tesla delivered 343,830 cars worldwide last quarter and will likely surpass its target for 50% growth this year. 

Tesla opened new factories in Germany in March and Texas a month later.

From the first quarter through the third, the electric vehicle maker delivered 908,573 cars. It needs to sell 495,685 more vehicles in the fourth quarter to meet the target.

Tesla is reportedly going all out in China, which houses the Giga Shanghai and generates roughly half of the company’s global output.

Tesla is getting workers to its production line at Giga Shanghai by paying thrice as much as they usually get paid.

Price Action: TSLA shares traded higher by 2% at $232.02 in the premarket on the last check Tuesday.

Photo: Courtesy of tesla.com