Tesla posts record revenue and profits in third quarter | 21 Oct 2021

Show #1251

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Good morning, good afternoon and good evening wherever you are in the world, welcome to EV News Daily for Thursday 21st October. It’s Martyn Lee here and I go through every EV story so you don't have to.

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"The company reported $1.62 billion in (GAAP) net income for the quarter, the second time it has surpassed $1 billion. In the year-ago quarter, net income was $331 million. The record results were driven by improved gross margins of 30.5% on its automotive business and 26.6% overall, both of which are records for at least the last five quarters." writes CNBC: "Automotive revenue rose to $12.06 billion and costs of automotive revenue amounted to $8.38 billion for the quarter. Tesla also generated $806 million in revenue from its energy business, which combines solar and energy storage products, and $894 million in services and other revenue, which includes vehicle maintenance and repairs, auto insurance and sales of Tesla-branded merchandise among other things"

"Tesla was aided by $279 million in sales of regulatory credits to rivals, although that number fell for the second straight quarter. CEO Elon Musk did not join the call, as he has typically done in the past. [CFO Zach] Kirkhorn said the company remained on track to achieve a goal of 50 percent year-over-year volume growth, although fourth-quarter production could be hampered by a number of factors, including the ongoing chip shortage or supply chain issues at ports around the U.S." writes Automotive News Europe: "He said Tesla planned to begin production at assembly plants in Texas and Germany before the end of the year, although the EV maker will not deliver vehicles from those factories until 2022."

Read more: https://www.cnbc.com/2021/10/20/tesla-tsla-earnings-q3-2021.html

Read more: https://europe.autonews.com/automakers/tesla-posts-162-billion-third-quarter-profit

"Nearly 150,000 Tesla cars are using the company’s new “safety score,” a tool rolled out last month to determine whether owners can access the beta version of its “Full Self-Driving” software, executives said during its third quarter earnings call." reports TechCrunch: "While 150,000 cars are now part of the Full Self-Driving (FSD) beta enrollment program, a fraction of drivers have been given access to the software. Only 2,000 drivers have been able to test the FSD program over the past year. Earlier this month, Tesla rolled out version 10.2 to around 1,000 additional owners with perfect safety scores. While the safety score, which must be a perfect 100 to gain access to the beta software, is being used to meter out access to FSD, Tesla has other uses in mind. The company wants to use the feature to better inform its blossoming telematics insurance product, which just launched in Texas in early October."

Read more: https://techcrunch.com/2021/10/20/tesla-third-quarter-earnings-safety-score/

"Tesla has confirmed that it has achieved an annual run rate of 1 million electric cars per year at the end of last quarter. After Tesla reported production of 237,823 vehicles and the delivery of 241,300 vehicles last quarter, we declared that Tesla has basically achieved a run rate of 1 million vehicles. Now the automaker confirmed that it exited the last quarter with a run rate of 1 million cars – an incredible achievement for a company that was only delivering a few thousand cars per year less than a decade ago." writes electrek.

Zach Kirkhorn CFPO said: "“We were also able to achieve an annualized production run rate of over 1 million cars towards the end of the quarter. The increase in production rate has been primarily been driven by further ramping of Model Y at Gigafactory Shanghai. Additionally, we have made great progress in increasing production volume of Model S and have recently started production and ramp of Model X.”

Read more: https://electrek.co/2021/10/20/tesla-achieves-annual-run-rate-1-million-electric-cars/

"In a move to offer reduced-cost Model 3s to the Chinese market, Tesla started offering its base Model 3 with an LFP battery pack. Since LFP chemistry makes for a less energy-dense cell, it provides a lower range but at significantly lower production costs. That move worked so well for Tesla that now, according to its 2021 Q3 shareholder deck (PDF), released Wednesday, it's moving to LFP chemistry for all of its standard-range vehicles around the world." reports CNET: "The current US Model 3 Standard Range Plus offers up 262 miles of EPA estimated range for a retail price of $43,490, including destination. It's unclear if Tesla will pass the savings from the chemistry switch on to its customers or if it will just pocket the difference, but what is clear is that we're likely to see a slight range dip from the change."

Read more: https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/every-electric-car-range-2021/

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"Tesla has officially launched the CCS Combo 1 adapter for its proprietary charging standard in South Korea - as reported earlier this month. It costs 299,200 KRW (about $255) and according to Tesla's website, allows charging at up to 500 V and up to 300 A, which means that the peak is limited to 150 kW. We guess that it might be less in the real world (like 100-120 kW), but let's wait for reports from the field." says InsideEVs: "An important piece of news is that the adapter is coming to North America soon. While the opening of the Supercharging network to other EVs was announced (through an app), it will probably first happen in Europe, where Superchargers already have plugs compatible with the CCS Combo 2 standard"

Read more: https://insideevs.com/news/541781/tesla-ccs1-adapter-us-soon/

"The 2022 Audi RS e-tron GT is the high-performance variant of Audi's first all-electric sedan, the e-tron GT. It's also closely related to Porsche's all-electric Taycan Turbo. According to the EPA, the RS e-tron GT should be capable of cruising 232 miles on a full battery charge before needing to plug in again. That's 20 miles more than the EPA projects for the 2021 Taycan Turbo — and 6 miles fewer than the standard e-tron GT." says edmunds.com: " the 2020 Taycan 4S outperformed its EPA range in our testing by a wider margin — 120 miles — than any other EV to date. Its official range for 2020 was 203 miles, yet it covered a remarkable 323 miles on our test loop. At the end of the day, we had traveled a total of 285 miles in the 2022 RS e-tron GT. That's 53 miles, or 22.8%, better than its EPA estimate — and 12 miles farther than the non-RS e-tron GT could manage. This range was achieved despite the RS e-tron GT's larger wheels and tires and its 42 extra pounds on our scales."

Read more: https://www.edmunds.com/car-news/tested-2022-audi-e-tron-gt-beats-epa-range-by-53-miles.html

"Aptera said it would have three Alpha prototypes before it started developing its Beta vehicles. After the Noir (black) and Sol (white), we were just waiting to see Luna (silver), which was released with a provocative YouTube video teasing billionaires that want to make tourism in space and settle on Mars." says Gus at autoevolution: "Being Aptera’s latest Alpha prototype does not mean that production is anywhere nearer. The company will now build ten Beta prototypes, which are meant for crash testing. The Gamma prototypes are like pre-production cars, while the Delta development phase corresponds to the production vehicles. As Jason Hill – Vehicle Designer at Aptera – said in a Q&A published on the company’s website, Beta vehicles will also incorporate “packaging and comfort improvements, and several refinements for the interior design including seating, door panel and instrument panel.” As Aptera’s FWD option, the Luna is the first example of the derivative that will eventually reach 1,000 miles of range with a 100 kWh battery pack."

Read more: https://www.autoevolution.com/news/aptera-luna-lands-on-youtube-teasing-those-wanting-to-move-to-mars-172279.html

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/oct/20/ambitious-uk-plans-for-electric-vehicles-welcomed-with-reservations

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