Operator
Thank you. Our next question comes from Toni Sacconaghi with Bernstein.
Toni Sacconaghi -- Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. -- Analyst
Yes, thank you. Elon, I was wondering if you could talk about this whole notion of raising capital for about the last year, you sort of shooed it as almost an evil thing, and I think a lot of investors believe that the Company might be better served and its growth aspirations if it did raise capital or had a stronger cash base. And given that you used up about $2 billion worth of cash in the quarter, aren't you potentially trying to go through a very thin space while trying to grow quickly and be self-funding, which, quite frankly, may be unrealistic. So, why not raise capital? And why do you view that as something that Tesla shouldn't do, or wouldn't do? And I have a follow-up, please.
Elon R. Musk -- Chief Executive Officer
Yeah. I mean, I don't think raising capital should be substitute for making the Company operate more effectively. So that -- in that sense, I think it's just -- it's important to have strong financial discipline of the Company and just to make sure we don't have extraneous expenses and that we're just being frugal with capital. If we keep raising capital every time, then it just take -- if we now have the forcing function for improving the fundamental operation of the business. So, I think it is healthy to be on a Spartan diet for a while. At this point, I do think there are -- it is similar to raising capital. That's a -- but this is sort of probably about the right timing, but yeah.
Toni Sacconaghi -- Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. -- Analyst
So, does that mean that investors should expect the capital raise in the near- to medium-term? And I hear you on the force and constraint, but I mean, growth does eat cash, especially in a capital-intensive business, and if you really do believe you have a first mover advantage, why wouldn't you want to push it as quickly as possible even if it meant raising capital in the short- term?
Elon R. Musk -- Chief Executive Officer
Yeah. First of all, I'll just say that I don't think that capital has been constraint on our growth thus far. And if I thought there was a final constraint on growth, we would have raised capital before now. But I think it is very important as the Company scales to make sure we are on a solid foundation and that we're -- we have the appropriate financial discipline throughout the Company and are spending money very efficiently. At this point, I think we are doing that, but there is more work to do. And Tesla today is far more efficiently operating organization than it was a year ago. We've made dramatic improvements across the board. And so, I think there is merit to the idea of raising capital at this point.
Zachary Kirkhorn -- Chief Financial Officer
Just to add to that, the journey we've been on for the last 12 months to 18 months on being more efficient and how we spend money has really changed the culture inside the Company. It enabled us to accelerate a number of cost reductions on the COGS side of our products and then make improvements in operating expenses as well. And then as we look forward to capital investments for Giga Shanghai and Model Y and ultimately our European facility, our CapEx per unit of capacity has come down significantly through the work of the team here. So, I think it has been a very productive journey for us.
Elon R. Musk -- Chief Executive Officer
And technically, we did raise some big capital in China for the Shanghai Giga on the order of $500 million. So, that -- we want to make sure that we don't have to grow upon global capitals fund under the Shanghai factory.
Martin Viecha -- Senior Director of Investor Relations
Thank you. So let's go to the next question, please.