The first China-made Model 3 will not be delivered before November, but Tesla apparently sold the first car in just a few minutes after it opened pre-orders on its website.
The US electric vehicle (EV) maker announced this on its Weibo today. Tesla said its entire website crashed from a huge traffic surge because so many people in China were trying to order Model 3s online.
The delivery time for the China-made Tesla will be between 6 to 10 months, and the cheapest version is priced at RMB 328,000 (roughly USD 47,500). Chinese customers who wish to order the car will need to pay an RMB 20,000 (USD 2,900) upfront deposit.
Tesla announced its plan to build China’s first wholly foreign-owned car plant in Shanghai last July. China is the world’s largest EV market and accounted for more than half of the global EV sales last year.