Battery Electric Vehicle News / Enjoying the Transportation Revolution

JKenH

Tesla EPS beats by $0.16, beats on revenue

https://seekingalpha.com/news/3624456-tesla-eps-beats-0_16-beats-on-revenue

JKenH

michaels said:

If you were a manufacturer who could make a car model 3 in two different locations, A and C to supply market E (where you can sell it for more than you can in either market C or market A) and it was cheaper to make it in location C would you make it in location A - especially when you could use the production facilities in A to instead make car model Y which is more profitable and can't currently be made in location C?

If you could successfully sell it in market A or C why would you keep cutting the price? Or if you  could make more profit in Market E why would you not already be exploiting it rather than selling in market C? Have Tesla only just realised that selling in Europe Is more profitable after slashing the price in China? If deliveries are supply constrained it would make no sense to cut the price in China or the US until demand and supply were in balance. 

We don’t actually know what demand there is in America, China or Europe - we only have number of deliveries so we can only speculate. What we do know is that production is ramping up in China and deliveries are effectively flat so there is excess capacity which can be exported to Europe. I do not believe Tesla are prioritising Europe over China to maximise profit, I just think they have excess manufacturing capacity in China and can serve the European market if demand is there. 

I take your point about building the ModelY in preference to the M3 in Fremont. Maybe China can also supply the US (although I doubt that would go down too well in the States.) 

Elon Musk said a year ago that the China factory was built to meet demand in the Chinese region and he speculated that there was sufficient demand to warrant multiple factories. Maybe between planning the factory and running it for 9 months things have changed and Tesla are responding to that changing situation. They are probably more flexible than other manufacturers and can do this.

I don’t know the answer I am just venturing an opinion based on the number of vehicles delivered in 2020 in the 3 markets. 

JKenH

Tesla's Q3 beat: 500K deliveries target still in play

https://seekingalpha.com/news/3624487-teslas-q3-beat-500k-deliveries-target-still-in-play

JKenH

LG Chem announced that it is preparing to triple cylindrical cell production and hinted that it would make its own battery cells like Tesla’s new 4680 cell.

I seem to recall from the Sandy Munro video on battery day that one of the contributors commented that other battery manufacturers were also working on new technologies.

https://electrek.co/2020/10/21/tesla-battery-supplier-lg-chem-prepares-to-triple-cylindrical-cell-production-own-4680-cell/

ABrass

UK model Ys are likely to be shipped from China. We're the only place in Europe to want a right hand steering wheel, whilst APAC have multiple countries that do. It wouldn't surprise me if all 3s and Ys for switched over to the Shanghai factory. Yes Berlin is closer but the way things are going the tariffs might be no different.

For standard range models the Chinese models seem slightly better. Full charge is recommended for the LFP batteries so you get more useful range.

EricMears

ABrass said:

UK model Ys are likely to be shipped from China. We're the only place in Europe to want a right hand steering wheel, whilst APAC have multiple countries that do. It wouldn't surprise me if all 3s and Ys for switched over to the Shanghai factory. Yes Berlin is closer but the way things are going the tariffs might be no different.

Berlin is indeed closer to UK than is China.  However, moving cars from Berlin to (say) London would involve some sort of overland transport from Berlin to nearest dock (or a longer trip to a shorter sea route)  then transferring them onto a ship.  It's highly likely that their Chinese factory could be a lot closer to a suitable seaport (ideally immediately adjacent) than is the Berlin one in which case the short land then long sea route  probably works out cheaper than a long land then short sea one.

And of course who can say what future tariffs might be ?  A new SinoBritish trade deal might offer a better deal than an EU_UK one (or not !).

Martyn1981

michaels said:

If you were a manufacturer who could make a car model 3 in two different locations, A and C to supply market E (where you can sell it for more than you can in either market C or market A) and it was cheaper to make it in location C would you make it in location A - especially when you could use the production facilities in A to instead make car model Y which is more profitable and can't currently be made in location C?

Yep, sounds right. But there is also another simpler answer based on Tesla's policy now of sandbagging* on every target they now make, and that's that the Shanghai factory is producing a lot more TM3's than Tesla said it would. This can be seen in the fact that they suggested reaching an annualised production rate of 150,000 units per year by the end of 2020, but they actually reached this level (3,000 per week) in the Spring. And secondly in yesterday's report where they changed this target to 250,000, so now aiming to reach 5,000 per week by the end of the year.

* 'Tesla lies' as Sandy Munro put it, commenting on them over delivering these days. This change of policy dates back to the TM3 ramp up, where they gave the best possible figures as a target guide, but instead the trolls, FUD'sters and shorts, used the targets to criticise the actual ramp up numbers, taking the shine off what was the largest, fastest ramp up of a mass produced (and profitable) BEV, helping to push the share price down to $179 (pre split).

PS - Nice use of capital letters, I didn't spot that at first.

Martyn1981

ABrass said:

UK model Ys are likely to be shipped from China. We're the only place in Europe to want a right hand steering wheel, whilst APAC have multiple countries that do. It wouldn't surprise me if all 3s and Ys for switched over to the Shanghai factory. Yes Berlin is closer but the way things are going the tariffs might be no different.

For standard range models the Chinese models seem slightly better. Full charge is recommended for the LFP batteries so you get more useful range.

Makes sense. On discussion comments (elsewhere) at least some European countries can order the TMY already, whilst the UK site will only let you stay updated. Obviously a lot might change by the time production begins in Berlin, but an understandable LHD / RHD difference already exists.

Martyn1981

I'm not sure if this is saying anything particularly new, but still fun to read:

Electric cars 'as cheap to manufacture' as regular models by 2024

Electric cars will cost the same to make as conventional cars, with internal combustion engines, by 2024 and an acceleration in the shift away from fossil fuel vehicles may be imminent, according to new research.

The extra cost of manufacturing battery electric cars versus their fossil fuel equivalents will diminish to just $1,900 (£1,470) per car by 2022, and disappear completely by 2024, according to research by the investment bank UBS. The research is based on detailed analysis of batteries from the seven largest manufacturers.

Reaching cost parity with the internal combustion engine (ICE) is seen as a key milestone in the world’s transition away from burning fossil fuels.

But it does raise a question, if BEV's are better and cheaper than ICEV's vehicles by 2024, then why would they 'only' account for 40% of sales by 2030 ..... supply constraints perhaps? Perhaps I'm being too optimistic, but I think BEV's could reach 10% in Europe next year, but again dependent on supply.

Globally UBS said electric cars’ market share would reach 17% by 2025. By 2030 electric cars should account for 40% of global sales.

JKenH

Tesla, Inc. (TSLA) CEO Elon Musk on Q3 2020 Results - Earnings Call Transcript

Bit of a long read but it did answer some questions for me (positively).  

https://seekingalpha.com/article/4380456-tesla-inc-tsla-ceo-elon-musk-on-q3-2020-results-earnings-call-transcript