Tesla offers China-made electric vehicle models for sale in Canada

Tesla is listing China-made Model 3 and Model Y models for sale in Canada, the company’s website showed yesterday, confirming the electric car maker has completed its first shipments to North America from its Shanghai factory.

Tesla’s website showed both rear-wheel drive Model Y vehicles and the long-range, allwheel drive version of the Model 3 available for immediate delivery in British Columbia, with codes showing they were manufactured at Tesla’s Gigafactory Shanghai.

Both models qualify for federal incentives of C$5,000 (R71,350) in Canada, which, unlike the US, does not link electric-vehicle subsidies to the location of the plant that made the car.

Tesla representatives in China and at its US headquarters did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The company and other electric car manufacturers have a cost advantage in China as exports from that market boom.

The China-made version of the Model Y was listed for C$61,990 (about R884,370) in Canada, about 22% more than the equivalent vehicle costs in China before incentives.

Tesla’s move to export to Canada from Shanghai could help it keep vehicles made at its plants in California and Texas for sale in the US, where they qualify for potential tax incentives of up to $7,500 about (R144,620) under the Biden administration’s subsidy programme.

It also opens a new market for Tesla Shanghai, which last year accounted for more than half the company’s production.

Tesla’s Shanghai factory manufactures EVs for sale in China and exports to overseas markets, including Europe.

But Tesla faces growing competition on price and features from EV makers in China, and its Berlin factory has been ramping up output of the Model Y for customers in Europe.

Tesla uses a code when listing vehicles for sale that corresponds to the first three digits of the vehicle identification number, or VIN.

The VINs for Tesla models built by the Shanghai factory all start with the letters “LRW”.

It was not clear how many China-made, Tesla vehicles were available for purchase in Canada or how many had been sold.

Tesla said last month that it would offer a new, cheaper version of its Model Y in Canada, a rear-wheel drive variant of the SUV-styled crossover that would qualify for Canadian government incentives.

The cars qualifying for that subsidy on Tesla’s website carry a VIN code showing they were built by the company’s Shanghai factory.

A Tesla production plan showed the carmaker had designed and tested Model Y vehicles for export to North America, with a target of producing nearly 9,000 for export this quarter.

A person with knowledge of the development, but did not want to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter, said those Model Y cars were bound for Canada.

It was not immediately clear what the equivalent target was for exports to Canada for the Model 3.

In November, Reuters reported Tesla had considered plans for exporting Chinamade cars to North America.

In response, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, in a Twitter post, had said “false”.