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http://www.cs.com.cn/ssgs/gsxw/201404/t20140402_4352548.html
For those who can't read Chinese:
1. The first batch of the Model S cars are expected to be delivered to Mainland customers on 22 April.
2. Tesla and the State Grid have preliminarily agreed on the charging specifications for Mainland.
3. Tesla is planning to establish a Chinese subsidiary in the Shanghai Waigaoqiao FTZ, and under the latest license plate restriction policy, EVs such as Tesla's Model S are likely to be exempted.
4. The rapid expansion of EV charging facilities are well underway. By the end of 2014, 100,000 charging posts will be built across the Mainland (mainly in 1st- and 2nd-tier cities in Eastern, Southern and Central provinces, plus Beijing and Tianjin in the North)
Source: China Securities Journal
For those who can't read Chinese:
1. The first batch of the Model S cars are expected to be delivered to Mainland customers on 22 April.
2. Tesla and the State Grid have preliminarily agreed on the charging specifications for Mainland.
3. Tesla is planning to establish a Chinese subsidiary in the Shanghai Waigaoqiao FTZ, and under the latest license plate restriction policy, EVs such as Tesla's Model S are likely to be exempted.
4. The rapid expansion of EV charging facilities are well underway. By the end of 2014, 100,000 charging posts will be built across the Mainland (mainly in 1st- and 2nd-tier cities in Eastern, Southern and Central provinces, plus Beijing and Tianjin in the North)
Source: China Securities Journal
Actually would really like to know how many orders there are from Chinese customers so far. As Tesla has only one store in Beijing at the moment, I wonder how the cars will be delivered to cities elsewhere and far away from Beijing i.e. say if I live in Chengdu and ordered a Model S on the website, how do I get the car? I'm guessing that if Tesla were to expand across China properly, and that they maintain their current direct-sale model, they will need to build a lot more service centres in major cities and perhaps work with local logistics companies to deliver the cars to customers who live outside cities.
USA is also a large country with many Tesla customers outside the major cities. Tesla employees will deliver the car wherever the customer requests. The only time a third party is involved is in states where they are barred from interacting with customers, like Texas. So, I don't see a unique problem in China, it can be handled by Tesla employees hired in-country.
Not sure how much time you've spent in China but based on your comment, probably not a lot (I mean no offense, sometimes even for me it's hard to make sense of how stuff works on the mainland). Sometimes it's convenient to just think that the Chinese market is similar to the American due to their similar sizes. But in reality, it is not. Tesla has been in negotiations with many third-parties locally for awhile now. I think its move into the Shanghai FTZ is a good one, but to expand across China properly, copying the US model isn't going to work fine.
