Tesla recall burdens Musk's production overdrive

Tesla is struggling to meet production goals for the Model 3, the mass-market car. sCEO Elon Musk today reportedly said the company is producing 2,000 Model 3s a week— 500 short of his goal, which has been adjusted twice. It was hit by an accident that will have the effect of a possible scale back of self-driving cars in the current quarter. And there is more difficult news for the Tesla car followers and supporters. Last week, Tesla voluntarily recalled 123,000 of its Model S luxury sedans to fix a power-steering issue. That is a lot of cars — close to half of all the vehicles the company has produced, wrote nbcnews. To make things worst, Tesla stock is down about 36 percent since its September 2017 peak. This is surely critical time for the self-driving car industry. It is undeniable that Tesla's venture has popularised self-driving cars across the globe, attracting competition in various countries, including France with the Navia.

Recode said Tesla’s voluntary recall of 123,000 Model S cars punctuated its ongoing struggles with meeting production goals of its mass-market vehicle, the Model 3.

"Can Tesla make the shift away from being just a luxury player to a mass-market carmaker at scale?," asked Recode.

By Musk’s own admission, the early years of Tesla — from the Roadster to the Model X — were in service of laying the groundwork for building and selling a mass-market electric vehicle.

In July 2017, Musk said that he aimed to produce 5,000 Model 3 vehicles per week by the end of 2017. Today, Tesla is producing 2,000 Model 3s a week, according to emails obtained by Jalopnik.

The company’s head of engineering also tried to rally the troops last week, saying the company needed to prove the “haters” wrong, as Bloomberg first reported.

“The world is watching us very closely, to understand one thing: How many Model 3s can Tesla build in a week?” Doug Field wrote. “This is a critical moment in Tesla’s history, and there are a number of reasons it’s so important. You should pick the one that hits you in the gut and makes you want to win.”

The article is adapted from Recode.