Tesla Gigafactory 3 drone video update: government says could be ready by May

Tesla’s Gigafactory 3 in Shanghai could be ready by May, according to a local government official.

A new drone video update of the progress at Gigafactory 3 shows that they are still working on the foundations of the building.

As we have often stated, the timing of bringing the Gigafactory 3 online is critical for Tesla.

The automaker’s demand in China, the world’s biggest auto market, is expected to fall next month after a planned import tariff increase as part of the trade war between China and Trump’s administration.

Tesla has been accelerating its plans to build a factory in the country in order to avoid those tariffs altogether.

CEO Elon Musk previously said that the actual Gigafactory 3 building could be ready this summer and they would start “some parts of Model 3 production” by the end of 2019.

Now Reuters reports that Chen Mingbo, a Shanghai city government official, said on Wednesday that the expected completion date of the factory is now in May.

Locals have been updating us on the activity at the Gigafactory 3 sites with drone videos on a weekly basis in order to monitor the construction progress of a factory that should be going up fast.

Last week, a Tesla Gigafactory 3 drone video update showed that they are preparing the foundation to start building the plant.

Now this week, a new drone video shows that Tesla is still working on the foundation, but they have moved the machinery around to the other side of the Gigafactory 3 site:

https://youtu.be/i5_CqeKY9sA

Electrek’s Take

It’s hard to believe that there will be a large building ready in May or June on this site, but I would never bet on China not building things fast.

I think the tougher timeline is not when the building is ready, but when there are cars coming out of it.

Tesla is aiming to do that by the end of the year, but they are not only talking about the start of production. Elon said that they are aiming for 3,000 Model 3’s per week at Gigafactory 3 by the end of the year.

That would be an insane achievement. I’ll believe it when I see it.

In the meantime, we will keep monitoring progress at Tesla’s Gigafactory 3.