Work on Tesla’s Shanghai factory, dubbed Gigafactory 3, is just about finished, and the company is weeks away from beginning large-scale manufacturing. Ars Technica reports: According to Bloomberg, Tesla chairman Robyn Denholm said last week that Tesla is waiting for manufacturing certification from local government. The company hopes that will happen before the end of the year. Tesla recently posted images of some of the first Chinese-made Model 3s on Weibo, a Chinese social media platform similar to Twitter. Tesla allowed Chinese reporters to take additional photos of the vehicle. There are a couple of obvious differences from the American model.
The back of the car has Chinese characters on the left and “Model 3” on the right. Like the cars Tesla is currently shipping to China, these new Model 3s also sport dual charging ports. One port is for the European Type 2 charging standard, while the other is for a Chinese charging standard. Tesla will initially use batteries from Panasonic in its Chinese-made cars, just as it does in the United States. Bloomberg recently reported that Tesla is negotiating a deal to start using batteries from Chinese battery maker CATL starting next year. Tesla is aiming to produce at least 1,000 vehicles per week at its Chinese factory before the end of the year. That could help Tesla achieve its overall goal to deliver at least 360,000 vehicles for the calendar year.
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Source:: Slashdot