S and X are niche market vehicles due to their price. Yes, right now Tesla has an S/X order backlog but the production line shutdown this year to retool for the major hardware changes appears to have taken longer than planned and that is part of the reason for why delivery times are so far out (global chip shortages may also be a factor). Before the production line shutdown delivery waits were just weeks, not many months. Tesla had adequate production capacity to handle global demand. So I see no reason for Tesla to set up additional production lines in other countries when demand is huge for the Y and 3 as well as the Cybertruck and Semi (which are years behind schedule). Tesla can maximize profits by investing in Y/3/CT/Semi production lines, and battery cell production, which is exactly what it is doing.
Elon said last year that going forward the S/X will contribute very little to Teslas overall revenue and ultimately will be considered a very minor part of Teslas history (I’m paraphrasing, can’t find the exact quote right now). He’s not saying that they aren’t great cars or that they should not have been built, just that in the big picture they will only represent a very small part of Teslas success.
Profits from the Y/3/CT/Semi will be orders of magnitude larger than the S/X.
