Tesla is now an official Chinese government car

Hong Kong CNN —

For the first time ever, Tesla cars have been placed on a Chinese government purchase list, according to state-owned media outlet Paper.cn.

Tesla is the only foreign-owned EV car brand on the purchase catalog published by the government of Jiangsu province in eastern China. The other brands mentioned include Volvo, owned by China’s Geely, and state-owned SAIC.

That means that government agencies and public groups in the province can procure them as service cars, highlighting the cozy relationship China has with Elon Musk’s company.

The development has gone viral on Chinese social media, with some users questioning if foreign cars should be considered for use by the government.

The Jiangsu government has tried to ease such concerns by saying that the Tesla model is “a domestic car, not imported,” according to a report by state-owned National Business Daily on Thursday, citing a government employee.

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Tesla, which has a massive gigafactory in Shanghai, manufactured some 947,000 cars in China in 2023, and most of them were used locally.

The Jiangsu government did not respond to CNN’s phone calls. On the government’s purchase catalog, Tesla’s Shanghai-made Model Y was listed at 249,900 yuan ($34,377).

China has become an increasingly important market for Tesla, as the country accounts for more than half ofthe world’s total EV sales. Last year, Tesla derived nearly a quarter of its total revenue from China.

But the