Elon Musk recently announced that Tesla is accelerating the timeline to bring Model Y to production in the summer of 2020, but now suppliers hint that it could happen even sooner.
In March, Tesla unveiled the Model Y, an all-electric crossover based on Model 3, with up to 300 miles of range.
The automaker said that it plans to bring the vehicle to production in fall 2020.
We recently learned that Tesla is working on a fifth assembly line at the Fremont factory as the automaker is preparing the production of its fifth electric vehicle.
With the release of its Q3 2019 financial results last month, Tesla announced that the preparations for the start of production are moving faster than anticipated:
Model Y equipment installation is under way in advance of the planned launch next year. We are moving faster than initially planned, using learnings and efficiencies gained from our Gigafactory Shanghai factory design.
Tesla confirmed that they are moving the timeline from fall 2020 to summer 2020:
We are also ahead of schedule to produce Model Y and now expect to launch by summer 2020.
But now a report from Taiwan about several Tesla suppliers claim that the automaker has requested that they expedite shipments of parts for Model Y to the current quarter.
United Daily News in Taiwan reported (translated from Chinese):
“Recently, Tesla has been successively notified that it requires advance preparation for Model Y mass production, which is about six months earlier than the original schedule.”
They didn’t confirm the volume planned for those parts.
Furthermore, the report also states the acceleration of part orders for the Tesla Semi program without confirming a timeline.
Last month, the automaker stated that Tesla Semi electric truck production is going to start ‘with limited volumes’ in 2020.
Electrek’s Take
Some people are speculating that it means Tesla is planning to start production this quarter, but I wouldn’t be so quick to jump to that conclusion.
If anything, Tesla is planning to start trial production and that can last a while before moving to the actual production.
However, it seems clear that Tesla is planning to start low volume production relatively soon. Likely in Q1 2020.
Elon made it clear that Tesla expects to be in volume Model Y production, which he now describes as “in excess of 1,000 units per week”, by “mid-2020”.
It means that Tesla has to start regular production weeks, if not months, before that.
Therefore, I am expecting the first full-production Model Y vehicles to roll off the line in Fremont in February-March 2020 and Tesla to ramp up production to around 1,000 units per week over the following few months.
What do you think? Let us know in the comment section below.
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