According to individuals familiar with the matter, Tesla Inc. is extending the halt of production in its shanghai plant till Thursday after the city was placed under phased lockdown due to a surge in coronavirus cases.
Exploring more information on the matter
As per Bloomberg News, the suspension was initially for a day at the Gigafactory near the leading financial center of China. It has now been halted for four days, and the work is expected to resume on April 1, as informed by people who did not wish to be identified as they do not have the authority to speak publicly.
Shanghai has lockdown half of its city to combat the surge in the covid outbreak and is testing en mass the biggest virus hotspot city. The Tesla plant, located to the east of Huangpu River and the surrounding areas, will be closed for four days from Monday. Many workers of the Tesla factory will be affected. They will only be able to come back to work while lockdown shifts to the other side of Shanghai.
As per the spokesperson of Tesla, the company has ensured fulfilling the primary responsibility of controlling and preventing the pandemic. The company is strictly implementing all the government policies and other related requirements.
The first factory of Tesla outside its home country manufactured half of the electric vehicle last year. This year, they had to suspend operations two days earlier this month. The company had said at that time they were making their best efforts to keep the production going and at the same time actively cooperating with the government’s order for pandemic prevention measures, including covid tests.
Tesla’s shanghai factory is crucial in China as they are the second-largest manufacturing market, and the plant makes cars for exports to Europe and other parts of Asia. The China passenger car association reported earlier this month that Tesla delivered 56,515 cars from the shanghai factory in February alone – 33,315 was for the export market and 23,200 for the domestic market.
Elon Musk, Chief Executive Officer of Tesla, had famously resisted the health regulators in California during their efforts to keep the U.S. factory closed during early pandemic days. After keeping the factory shut for about seven weeks, Musk reopened the plant, which was the only one operating in US. on May 11, 2020, daring the country’s officials and authorities to arrest him.
This dispute was also one of the main reasons Musk shifted Tesla’s Headquarters to Austin, Texas, from Palo Alto, California.
Tesla has three plants on three continents. In North America, where the original factory is in California, in Shanghai, and Europe, the first Tesla Model Y was delivered from the new factory near Berlin. In a few weeks, Tesla will open its fourth factory in Austin.
