Tesla’s Q2 Earnings: Steady As She Goes
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Tesla has released their shareholder statement for Q2 2011, and while it doesn’t make for the most exciting reading, it’s at least full of fairly good news. They’ve been on cruise control for quite a while now, if you will, designing and testing their Model S sedan, but there are plenty of pitfalls that could have afflicted the process, techniques and technologies that could have failed to pan out, and cost overruns that could have piled up. But no, things are going as expected and barring any major upsets, they should have the Model S rolling out in mid-2012 as planned.
Here are a few Q2 takeaways from the letter:
- Total revenue for Q2: $58m ($27m in Roadster revenue, $19m from Toyota for RAV4 EV development, $11m from powertrain sales)
- Projected 2011 revenue: $180-190m (up slightly from previous estimates)
- Operating expenses for Q2: $77m
- Projected 2011 operating expenses: $220-245m (up from <$200m in previous estimates)
- Cash on hand: $331m
- Remaining in Dept of Energy loan: $331m
- Final Roadsters should be built by January (total of 2500 vehicles)
- RAV4 EV development should be finished in early 2012, vehicle shipping that year (more from Toyota soon)
- Model S should be shipping in “mid-2012,” Model X crossover in late 2013 at the earliest
- Over 5600 Model S reservations with accelerating growth
- Model S currently in “beta” form with prototype tooling and processes, should enter “release candidate” form in Q1 2012
- 150 hires this quarter, total team ~1400 now
And that’s that. The full letter, with cost and sales breakdowns, can be read here (PDF), and more information, including a link to the investors’ conference call and Q&A, can be found at their investor relations page.
Basically we’re not going to hear much news until the production Model S starts hitting car mags (we’ll try to get one too), the Model X gets leaked or previewed, and the RAV4 gets priced and dated — all of which will be happening in 2012, most likely. That means a few more quiet quarters. With so many pre-orders for the Model S, they’re sure to have plenty of revenue as soon as they start charging their customers — with a few hundred million dollars locked down for the next few years, they’re feeling confident and I’m guessing their investors are as well.
Update: Elon Musk mentioned in the conference call that they plan to unveil the Model X prototype in mid-December.
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