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0/ In this thread I will explain how a new, more reliable estimate for battery costs affects gross margins for model 3.
1/ Thanks to the great work of @subach, which was thoroughly verified by @KawasakiKR11 we now know more about $TSLA battery costs. Most likely these costs are $240/kWh. We can use it to compute the cost price of model 3.
2/ To compute the cost price of a model 3 we also need labor and other production costs and costs of other materials than batteries. I found 2 sources to estimate these costs.
3/ Musk said cost price of a model 3 would be $38k. I assume that is for the base model with a battery of 50 kWh with cost price of $12k. Assuming his estimate excludes service and logistics costs we arrive at $26k for production and other materials.
digitaltrends.com/cars/tesla-mod…
digitaltrends.com/cars/tesla-mod…
4/ German engineers estimated $28k for model 3 (base model?): $18k materials and $10k labor. I think they estimated the costs of the batteries too low, at $120/kWh or $6k instead of $240/kWh or $12k. So a corrected estimate would be $34k.
wiwo.de/technologie/mo…
wiwo.de/technologie/mo…
5/ $34k is more or less inline with Musk's own estimate. Musk's estimate might be higher because without doubt $TSLA's production processes have lower than German efficiency.
6/ So from these 2 estimates my estimate for production costs is $12k for the batteries, $10k for production and $16k for other materials, for the base model 3 (has not been produced so far). In total $38k, (equals Musk's estimate).
7/ We can compute battery and other costs for several variants of model 3. Base model=50 kWh, Midrange=62kWh and Long range=75 kWh. $1k extra costs for all-wheel-drive, $3k for service and warranty, $5k for the performance version.
8/ I have compared cost prices with list prices on wikipedia: en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Mod… I have not taken any free-charging costs, trade-in losses or sales discounts into account.
9/ See my spreadsheet (picture below).
You can play with the numbers yourself after downloading it from:
drive.google.com/open?id=12P9u5…
You can play with the numbers yourself after downloading it from:
drive.google.com/open?id=12P9u5…
10/ Though I have been kind for $TSLA while estimating costs it seems gross margins are extremely low. Much lower than it appears from their financial reports. Other features such as full self-driving may or may not make up for the difference.
11/ I do not think $TSLA still sells the full self-driving option. So for now my conclusion is only the Long Range All-Wheel-Drive performance version is the only really profitable model 3. /END
