Revenue and gross profit hit a new quarterly high in the first quarter, and the operating profit margin ranked first among all batch OEMs
On April 21, 2022, Beijing time, global electric vehicle giant Tesla (TSLA.US) released the first quarter of 2022 results, with total revenue increasing by 81% year-on-year to $18.7 billion, of which automobile revenue increased by 87% year-on-year to $16.8 billion.
In terms of automobile production and sales, the total production of vehicles in the first quarter was 305,407 units, an increase of 69% year-on-year; the number of automobile deliveries was 310,048 units, an increase of 68% year-on-year, setting a record for the highest number of vehicle deliveries in a single quarter. Auto revenue gross margin increased by 6.4 percentage points year-on-year, exceeding 30% for the first time to 32.9%.
In addition, in the first quarter of 2022, services and other gross margins rose to -0.6%, near breakeven, driven by growth in used car sales, merchandise sales, collision centers and related services. In the first quarter, Tesla's insurance business continued to expand with recent expansions in Colorado, Oregon, and Virginia.
It is worth mentioning that Tesla's operating margin in the first quarter reached 19.7%, setting a new record for a single-quarter operating margin among all batch OEMs.
The Shanghai plant lost about a month of production, and the new plant in Austin, Texas, began delivering the ModelY in April
Since the beginning of this year, the production situation of Tesla's main factory has been different. Tesla's Shanghai factory had high weekly productivity in the first quarter, but due to the recent impact of the epidemic, the factory and some supply chains were temporarily closed, resulting in a loss of about a month's production volume at the Shanghai factory, which will affect the total construction volume and delivery volume in the second quarter. However, recently there is news that Tesla's Shanghai Gigafactory has 8,000 employees on the job, and the vehicle assembly is gradually recovering.
Deliveries of the ModelY began in April at the new plant in Austin, Texas, U.S.A., and the first vehicles equipped with 4680 one-piece front body castings and structural battery packs were delivered at the CyberRodeo opening ceremony.
Berlin-Brandenburg in Europe has started production of the Gigafactory in March 2022 and uses a non-structural battery pack with a 2170 battery, and it is expected that this year GigafactoryTexas will be able to use both the structural elements of the 4680 battery and the modelY with the non-structural components of the 2170 battery.
However, as the Austin and Berlin plants are just getting started, initial inefficiencies are expected to begin to affect overall gross margins in the second quarter.
Nearly half of the cars are equipped with lithium iron phosphate batteries that do not contain nickel or cobalt, and dedicated self-driving taxis are expected to be mass-produced in 2024
Since 2021, the price of lithium battery materials has risen rapidly, and Tesla is also reducing costs by adjusting the composition of lithium battery materials. It is reported that nearly half of the cars tesla produced in the first quarter were equipped with lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries that do not contain nickel or cobalt. Currently, LFP batteries are used in most of Tesla's standard range vehicle products as well as commercial energy storage applications, and the Model3 equipped with LFP battery packs can still achieve 267 miles of EPA range due to the use of energy-efficient motors.
Autonomous driving and full self-driving (FSD) remain tesla's efforts to improve, Tesla said its development of FSD Beta continues with seven software updates in 2022, and the Tesla team continues to work to reduce human intervention, especially by reducing sudden slowdowns, to improve unprotected left turn and smooth driving. Tesla aims to release FSDBeta to all U.S. FSD customers by the end of 2022 and to launch FSDBeta for the first time to some customers in Canada in March 2022.
Tesla said it is developing a dedicated self-driving taxi that is highly optimized for autonomy without the need to install steering wheels and pedals in an attempt to achieve the lowest cost per kilometer, expecting mass production in 2024 and expected to achieve serialruck production next year.
The author | Wang Xiao