Tesla likely to shelve plans for India factory
At least that is what the news agency Bloomberg reports. Elon Musk had postponed a visit to India planned for the end of April and contact has apparently been broken off since then. The fact that Musk and his executives have not made any further enquiries to the authorities in New Delhi since then – which apparently happened frequently until April – leads the informants, who are obviously close to the government, to assume that contact is no longer desired.
The report also states that the Tesla contacts had made it clear to the government “that Tesla had capital problems and was not planning any new investments in India in the near future”. There has been no official statement from Tesla or the government in New Delhi to date.
Elon Musk’s visit, planned for April, was originally seen as one of the last steps before the announcement of the new Gigafactory. A few weeks earlier, the Indian government had lowered import duties for electric cars from foreign manufacturers, which was also seen as a concession to Tesla: In addition to Indian-made models, this would have allowed Tesla to sell imported vehicles in the country. There has already been speculation about specific factories where the vehicles for export to India could be built. In April, four states were also named as potential favourites for the location of the planned factory.
Although Tesla was able to slightly increase deliveries again in the second quarter, production remains significantly below the previous year. In addition, the first fundamentally new Tesla model in several years, the Cybertruck, is off to a slow start. There are also delays in the construction of the plant in Mexico, which is already underway. In general, there have recently been rumours that Elon Musk could increasingly shift Tesla’s focus towards renewable energies and automation – and thus move away from the traditional electric car business.
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