Electric car maker Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA) says it will deliver its first Chinese made Model 3 sedans to the public on January 7 of this year at an event at its new Shanghai plant.
The Shanghai plant is part of the Silicon Valley automaker’s plans to bolster its presence in the world’s biggest auto market and minimize the impact of the U.S.-China trade war. Fifteen Tesla employees who had purchased a car were the first to receive their Model 3s after the first China-made vehicles rolled off the plant’s production line last October.
The deliveries come a year after construction of Tesla’s only plant outside the United States began. Production started in October with a target of 250,000 vehicles a year once the Model Y is added to the line up.
The Model 3 is priced at 355,800 yuan ($50,000 U.S.). Tesla said previously that it wanted to start deliveries before the Chinese New Year that starts on January 25. Tesla’s China General Manager Wang Hao said the company plans to ramp up Model 3 deliveries in January. Tesla executives also told reporters the plant had achieved a production target of 1,000 units a week, or around 280 cars a day.
