Tesla China strayed from its typical delivery strategy in June. As per data released today by the China Passenger Car Association (CPCA), Tesla was able to deliver 74,212 vehicles to the domestic auto market in June. A total of 19,468 cars were also exported.
With these results, Tesla’s domestic deliveries in June actually saw a 4.78% decline from the 77,938 units that were sold in the same month last year. The results showed an improvement of 74.58% compared to May, however. For context, May saw 42,508 Teslas delivered locally. The CPCA’s data also revealed that the Model 3 and Model Y sold 30,637 and 63,043 units in June including exports.
Gigafactory Shanghai is Tesla’s largest factory by output today, and it also serves as the company’s primary vehicle export hub. This means that for the first half of every quarter, Giga Shanghai typically allots its resources to producing cars that will be exported to foreign territories. The facility then shifts its efforts to the domestic market in the latter half of a quarter.
This system typically results in the final month of a quarter’s deliveries being mostly focused on the domestic market. This changed notably in the second quarter, as Tesla China still exported 19,468 cars despite June being the final month of Q2 2023.
The change in Giga Texas’ export strategy may be partly due to the addition of Canada as a destination for the facility’s Model Y crossovers. Initial reports of this strategy were posted back in April, with Reuters, citing an internal production memo and a person familiar with the matter, claimed that Giga Shanghai had started producing a version of the Model Y that will be sold in Canada.
Sure enough, drone flyovers from longtime Tesla China watcher Wu Wa revealed a massive fleet of electric vehicles gathered at the Shanghai South Port in mid-June. The vehicles in the export fleet were reportedly marked for Canada.
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