Toronto, Ontario — In this weekly Tuesday Ticker, Tesla nearly meets its delivery goal for 2021—prompting big gains—while Hyundai plans the funeral for its internal combustion engine development unit.
Tesla tops it off
Tesla was quite outspoken in 2021 regarding its million-vehicle delivery goal but, according to a company release from Sunday, the company came just short of its mark.
The electric vehicle manufacturer reported it delivered 936,172 vehicles in 2021—an 87 percent increase from last year. It delivered 308,000 of those cars amid Q4 2021, marking a 71 percent increase in Q4 deliveries from last year’s fourth-quarter.
According to the release, the majority of vehicles delivered in Q4 were Model 3 sedans and Model Y hatchbacks. Wall Street analysts had anticipated about 266,000 vehicles to be delivered in Q4 2021, with about 855,000 predicted for the year.
On Friday, Dec. 31, Tesla stock closed at $1,056.78. Shares of the stock closed at $1,189.70 per share Monday, up nearly 13 percent from Friday’s close.
Melting ICE
Hyundai will soon cease its development of internal combustion engines, reported the Korea Economic Daily in late December.
According to the Korean news channel, newly-appointed Hyundai R&D Chief Park Chung-kook sent an email to employees in late Dec., where he called the OEM’s endeavours in engine development “a great achievement,” while simultaneously noting it is “inevitable to convert to electrification.”
Changes reportedly include the shuffling of teams that focused on powertrains to electrification development; the engine design unit to an electrification design center and the powertrain development center changes to the electrification test center.
Park said the reorganization is aimed to help the company tackle the task of developing vehicles more likely to dominate the electric vehicle market. The OE will also take on raw materials for batteries and semiconductors since they also occupy an important place in the automobile supply chain, something that became evident during the pandemic, reported the Korea Economic Daily.
Hyundai shares grew 3.11 percent in the immediate 24 hours following the report.
