While Chinese companies like Huawei have been facing difficulties in the US, Tesla has been flourishing in the market ever since its gigfactory in Shanghai opened up. The US electric carmaker is being pushed by China-which is the world’s biggest car market- to make more and more electric vehicles, as the nation tries to combat air pollution. However, recently the Chinese government officials have called in Tesla’s representatives over complains that have been issued by Chinese consumers about battery fires, faulty acceleration, and software update failure.
Chinese authorities said in a post online, that a group of them including but not only their Ministry of Industry and IT, cyberspace watchdog and transportation authorities, recently held talks with Tesla regarding their deteriorating quality, as reported by consumers.
Tesla issued a response online as well saying that they accept the government guidelines and would thoroughly investigate the matter. Moreover, they said that they have and would continue to strictly comply with the Chinese laws.
Tesla has had slipups with quality earlier as well. While its popularity rose, Tesla has had to make a series of recalls due to faulty parts in the country, and in may the Chinese IT ministry had urged again Tesla to ensure consistency it its vehicles after some consumers had complained about the not-so-advanced computer chips in the cars.
Earlier this month, the company issued one of its biggest recalls to date, bringing back 135,000 Model S and Model X sport utility vehicles over touch-screen failures.
China is Tesla’s second largest market and is thus extremely important for them. The company also get tax breaks in their Shanghai factory, allowing them to localize both production and procurement and expand their market even more. In the same Gigafactory, Tesla has been developing its Model 3 electric sedans and also its Model Y sport-utility vehicles.
In the last year itself, China paid $6.66 billion in revenue to Tesla, and its sales of electric vehicles in China, both of hydrogen powered and plug-in hybrid vehicles has been forecasted to rise from 5% now to 20% in 2025.
