Heading into today’s car delivery estimate, Tesla had previewed that for the first half of 2017 it expects a substantial jump in vehicle deliveries. Recall that management guided for a 61% to 71% increase in Model S and Model X deliveries during H1 of 2017 compared with the first half of 2016. To achieve this goal, Tesla would need to deliver 47,000 to 50,000 vehicles in Q1 and Q2 combined. Moments ago Tesla announced its first half vehicle deliveries, and it made the low end of this guidance: just barely, with 47,100 autos delivered.
Tesla delivered just over 22,000 vehicles in Q2, of which just over 12,000 were Model S and just over 10,000 were Model X. This represents a 53% increase over Q2 2016. Total vehicle deliveries in the first half of 2017 were approximately 47,100.
However, where Tesla clearly failed to deliver was relative to sellside consensus which expected the electric car maker to sell 22,912 cars in Q2. Instead, the official number was 22,000. Which explains the very next sentence, in which Elon Musk delivered the latest the mea culpa why the company once again failed to hit expected deliveries.
The major factor affecting Tesla’s Q2 deliveries was a severe production shortfall of 100 kWh battery packs, which are made using new technologies on new production lines. The technology challenge grows exponentially with energy density. Until early June, production averaged about 40% below demand. Once this was resolved, June orders and deliveries were strong, ranking as one of the best in Tesla history.
Odd how this production bottleneck was never made clear to any of the analysts covering the company so they could adjust their forecasts accordingly.
Tesla also issued a conditional guidance for second half, in which Tesla said that “provided global economic conditions do not worsen considerably, we are confident that combined deliveries of Model S and Model X in the second half of 2017 will likely exceed deliveries in the first half of 2017.”
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