Elon Musk confirmed that Tesla has plans to bring the new Model S Plaid to China early next year. The automaker’s flagship sedan could prove popular in the country.
International markets have been deprived of Tesla Model Ss and Model Xs for almost two years now.
Tesla faced delays in bringing the refreshed version of those vehicles to market.
New Model S deliveries finally started in June, and Tesla recently managed to ramp up production close to previous levels before production was halted for the refresh.
But deliveries have been limited to the US and a few in Canada lately.
Today, CEO Elon Musk gave the first timeline for expanding deliveries to China.
He said that he is expecting Model S Plaid deliveries to start in China around March 2022:
China is arguably Tesla’s most important market right now, thanks to an incredible ramp-up at Gigafactory Shanghai, but Tesla’s Chinese factory only produces Model 3 and Model Y.
The Model S is still only coming from Fremont factory in the US.
Importing the vehicle in China adds significantly to the cost of the vehicle, but the price is not as big a factor for the Plaid, which is the top performance version.
Tesla enjoys a strong base of wealthy customers who like to always have the latest top version of its vehicles, and that’s now the Model S Plaid.
With Tesla growing its base market in China over the last two years with Model 3 and Model Y, it will be interesting to see how big a market it opened for the Model S Plaid in the country.
As we recently reported, Tesla has been pushing Model S and Model X delivery timelines to as far as 2023 in the US.
The start of production batches for international deliveries is expected to be part of why the delivery timelines are so long.
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