Tesla doubles revenue ahead of Model 3 release
Sales and revenue are up in the first quarter as the company gets set for mass production. But it still posts a $330 million loss thanks largely to that SolarCity acquisition.
As we get closer and closer to the release of the Model 3, there are more and more eyes on Tesla and the company's financial health. Those eyes will find mostly good news from the company's update for the first quarter of 2017, with Tesla posting $2.7 billion in GAAP revenue. That's more than double the $1.15 billion the company posted in the same period last year.
That boost is helped in large part from vehicle production growing by 64 percent compared to the same period in 2016, resulting in a total of 25,051 vehicle deliveries. These results keep Tesla ahead of Wall Street expectations, which sat at $2.6 billion in revenue.
Despite that, Tesla net losses widened in Q1 to $330 million, with the company pinning $100 million of that on the controversial SolarCity acquisition (a partnership that produced those crazy solar tiles) and a further $35 million down to foreign transaction fees. The company still has $4 billion in cash on hand, more than enough to carry that kind of loss through the release of Model 3.
Speaking of Model 3, Tesla says production is still on target, set to begin in July. By the end of 2017, Tesla promises to be producing 5,000 of the $35,000 sedans per week, doubling that by the end of 2018. The company is also making significant expansions of its service centers to handle the anticipated load. With 30 percent more service centers globally, and with centers themselves getting bigger, getting your Tesla serviced should soon be a lot easier than it is today.