News
Tesla China pushes back MIC Model 3 deliveries amid coronavirus outbreak
As the novel coronavirus outbreak continues in China, Tesla has opted to postpone MIC Model 3 deliveries scheduled for February, at least until the situation in the country improves. The update was related by Tesla China VP for External Affairs Grace Tao Lin, who noted on Weibo that MIC Model 3 deliveries will likely be pushed back, perhaps as far back as the third quarter of 2020.
Giga Shanghai currently has a run rate of 3,000 Model 3s per week and is poised to hit an annual production rate of 150,000 vehicles. The company has also launched the Model Y program in the country. With these in mind, the recently-announced delays will likely set back the ramp of the locally-made Model 3, while potentially pushing back the Model Y program in the country.
Interestingly enough, Tesla has noted that it does not expect a big financial hit in China due to the coronavirus outbreak. This is because the MIC Model 3 only represents a small fraction of the company’s quarterly profits, according to Tesla’s finance chief Zach Kirkhorn during the company’s Q4 2019 earnings call.
Analysts currently expect markets to underperform because of the ongoing coronavirus outbreak. However, Tesla seems to be defying the odds so far. This week, the Tesla stock continued to soar, with the Silicon Valley-based electric carmaker surpassing the current valuation of Volkswagen and BMW combined on Monday. Tesla’s price per share hit past $900 and settled at $887.06 when the market closed on Tuesday
The real impact of production delays and supply chain issues might be felt soon though if the closure of factories across China will be stretched to mid-March. Automotive research firm IHS Markit estimates that carmakers may lose about 1.7 million units during the first quarter of 2020. This corresponds to a 32.3% decline from the firm’s initial estimates.
“In this scenario, we might expect the potential of a China-wide supply chain disruption caused by parts shortages from Hubei, a major component hub — and adjacent province closures for the majority of the month of February as a result,” IHS Markit wrote in a press release.
The Shanghai government has ordered the shutdown of companies in the city, including Giga Shanghai, amid the coronavirus outbreak. Government and private companies are not allowed to resume operations before Feb. 9. Prior to the suspension of work, the government has also extended the Lunar New Year holidays to help control the spread of the 2019-nCOV that started in Wuhan, a city about 9 hours away by car from Shanghai.
Tesla is not the sole automaker that is being affected by the ongoing outbreak. Hyundai, Toyota, Ford, Nissan, Volkswagen, Daimler, and Continental have also shut down their respective factories in China due to the virus.
Based on the latest updates, there are more than 24,000 people infected by the coronavirus that causes fever, serious respiratory illness, impaired liver function, and kidney failure. As of Wednesday local time, there have been 490 deaths reported in connection to the virus. The World Health Organization has declared the outbreak, which has infected people in 25 countries, a public health emergency. The United States and several countries have also implemented travel bans to and from China.
In response to the coronavirus outbreak, Tesla China has offered local customers free Supercharging for an indefinite time to make traveling easier for drivers who reside in areas affected by the outbreak.
Amid the public health scare, Tesla has continued to provide customer support through Douyin, China’s version of TikTok. Tesla sales staff from certain experience centers live-streamed tours of the Made-in-China Model 3 and entertained questions from potential buyers. The company has also posted schedules of the live streams that interested consumers can join via Douyin.
Meanwhile, Tesla owners in China united to raise 123,000 yuan or about $17,500 to purchase N95 masks, surgical masks, and sets of protective clothing that they plan to donate to different hospitals treating patients infected by the coronavirus. Tesla has also donated 5 million yuan or more than $700,000 to assist the government and other institutions involved in disease control.
The recent news from China appears to have weighed down on Tesla stock. As of writing, TSLA stock is trading
News
Tesla FSD’s newest model is coming, and it sounds like ‘the last big piece of the puzzle’
“There’s a model that’s an order of magnitude larger that will be deployed in January or February 2026.”
Tesla Full Self-Driving’s newest model is coming very soon, and from what it sounds like, it could be “the last big piece of the puzzle,” as CEO Elon Musk said in late November.
During the xAI Hackathon on Tuesday, Musk was available for a Q&A session, where he revealed some details about Robotaxi and Tesla’s plans for removing Robotaxi Safety Monitors, and some information on a future FSD model.
While he said Full Self-Driving’s unsupervised capability is “pretty much solved,” and confirmed it will remove Safety Monitors in the next three weeks, questions about the company’s ability to give this FSD version to current owners came to mind.
Musk said a new FSD model is coming in about a month or two that will be an order-of-magnitude larger and will include more reasoning and reinforcement learning.
He said:
“There’s a model that’s an order of magnitude larger that will be deployed in January or February 2026. We’re gonna add a lot of reasoning and RL (reinforcement learning). To get to serious scale, Tesla will probably need to build a giant chip fab. To have a few hundred gigawatts of AI chips per year, I don’t see that capability coming online fast enough, so we will probably have to build a fab.”
NEWS: Elon Musk says FSD Unsupervised is “pretty much solved at this point” and that @Tesla will be launching Robotaxis with no safety monitors in about 3 weeks in Austin, Texas. He also teased a new FSD model is coming in about 1-2 months.
“We’re just going through validation… https://t.co/Msne72cgMB pic.twitter.com/i3wfKX3Z0r
— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) December 10, 2025
It rings back to late November when Musk said that v14.3 “is where the last big piece of the puzzle finally lands.”
With the advancements made through Full Self-Driving v14 and v14.2, there seems to be a greater confidence in solving self-driving completely. Musk has also personally said that driver monitoring has been more relaxed, and looking at your phone won’t prompt as many alerts in the latest v14.2.1.
This is another indication that Tesla is getting closer to allowing people to take their eyes off the road completely.
Along with the Robotaxi program’s success, there is evidence that Tesla could be close to solving FSD. However, it is not perfect. We’ve had our own complaints with FSD, and although we feel it is the best ADAS on the market, it is not, in its current form, able to perform everything needed on roads.
But it is close.
That’s why there is some legitimate belief that Tesla could be releasing a version capable of no supervision in the coming months.
All we can say is, we’ll see.
Investor's Corner
SpaceX IPO is coming, CEO Elon Musk confirms
However, it appears Musk is ready for SpaceX to go public, as Ars Technica Senior Space Editor Eric Berger wrote an op-ed that indicated he thought SpaceX would go public soon. Musk replied, basically confirming it.
Elon Musk confirmed through a post on X that a SpaceX initial public offering (IPO) is on the way after hinting at it several times earlier this year.
It also comes one day after Bloomberg reported that SpaceX was aiming for a valuation of $1.5 trillion, adding that it wanted to raise $30 billion.
Musk has been transparent for most of the year that he wanted to try to figure out a way to get Tesla shareholders to invest in SpaceX, giving them access to the stock.
He has also recognized the issues of having a public stock, like litigation exposure, quarterly reporting pressures, and other inconveniences.
However, it appears Musk is ready for SpaceX to go public, as Ars Technica Senior Space Editor Eric Berger wrote an op-ed that indicated he thought SpaceX would go public soon.
Musk replied, basically confirming it:
As usual, Eric is accurate
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 10, 2025
Berger believes the IPO would help support the need for $30 billion or more in capital needed to fund AI integration projects, such as space-based data centers and lunar satellite factories. Musk confirmed recently that SpaceX “will be doing” data centers in orbit.
AI appears to be a “key part” of SpaceX getting to Musk, Berger also wrote. When writing about whether or not Optimus is a viable project and product for the company, he says that none of that matters. Musk thinks it is, and that’s all that matters.
It seems like Musk has certainly mulled something this big for a very long time, and the idea of taking SpaceX public is not just likely; it is necessary for the company to get to Mars.
The details of when SpaceX will finally hit that public status are not known. Many of the reports that came out over the past few days indicate it would happen in 2026, so sooner rather than later.
But there are a lot of things on Musk’s plate early next year, especially with Cybercab production, the potential launch of Unsupervised Full Self-Driving, and the Roadster unveiling, all planned for Q1.
Tesla has added the 15th automaker to the growing list of companies whose EVs can utilize the Supercharger Network this year, as BMW is the latest company to gain access to the largest charging infrastructure in the world.
BMW became the 15th company in 2025 to gain Tesla Supercharger access, after the company confirmed to its EV owners that they could use any of the more than 25,000 Supercharging stalls in North America.
Welcome @BMW owners.
Download the Tesla app to charge → https://t.co/vnu0NHA7Ab
— Tesla Charging (@TeslaCharging) December 10, 2025
Newer BMW all-electric cars, like the i4, i5, i7, and iX, are able to utilize Tesla’s V3 and V4 Superchargers. These are the exact model years, via the BMW Blog:
- i4: 2022-2026 model years
- i5: 2024-2025 model years
- 2026 i5 (eDrive40 and xDrive40) after software update in Spring 2026
- i7: 2023-2026 model years
- iX: 2022-2025 model years
- 2026 iX (all versions) after software update in Spring 2026
With the expansion of the companies that gained access in 2025 to the Tesla Supercharger Network, a vast majority of non-Tesla EVs are able to use the charging stalls to gain range in their cars.
So far in 2025, Tesla has enabled Supercharger access to:
- Audi
- BMW
- Genesis
- Honda
- Hyundai
- Jaguar Land Rover
- Kia
- Lucid
- Mercedes-Benz
- Nissan
- Polestar
- Subaru
- Toyota
- Volkswagen
- Volvo
Drivers with BMW EVs who wish to charge at Tesla Superchargers must use an NACS-to-CCS1 adapter. In Q2 2026, BMW plans to release its official adapter, but there are third-party options available in the meantime.
They will also have to use the Tesla App to enable Supercharging access to determine rates and availability. It is a relatively seamless process.
Tesla FSD’s newest model is coming, and it sounds like ‘the last big piece of the puzzle’
SpaceX IPO is coming, CEO Elon Musk confirms
