Tesla shows off Chinese-made Model 3s ahead of Shanghai factory start

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  A Tesla Model 3 made in China’s new factory. [credit: Tesla ]

Tesla is famous for missing deadlines, but the company’s Shanghai factory, dubbed Gigafactory 3, seems to be almost on schedule. Tesla broke ground on the facility in January, aiming to complete work by October. Now media reports indicate that work is just about finished, and the company is weeks away from beginning large-scale manufacturing.

According to Bloomberg, Tesla chairman Robyn Denholm said last week that Tesla is waiting for manufacturing certification from local government. The company hopes that will happen before the end of the year.

Tesla recently posted images of some of the first Chinese-made Model 3s on Weibo, a Chinese social media platform similar to Twitter. Tesla allowed Chinese reporters to take additional photos of the vehicle. There are a couple of obvious differences from the American model.