Tesla’s growth over the years has undeniably been one of the talks of the decade. What started off in 2003 as a mission to change the stigma and improve the overall automation of electric cars, is now a billion-dollar automotive and clean energy company with stellar AI and cloud developments in their processes.
Becoming a household name by pioneering and being a leader in the electric vehicle industry, Tesla has expanded its horizons in manufacturing and selling battery and solar panel technology.
As a testament to their innovation, Tesla’s global production and sales results in the first quarter of 2022 did not disappoint. Deliveries reached a quarterly record, while the production was at a near-record level. That was outstanding news considering how challenging the global economy and automotive industry is in particular, where global automobile sales across brands had been predicted to fall to just under 70 million units in 2021. Tesla increased its overall electric car production in Q1 by about 69% year-over-year to 305,407, just a few hundred units below the record of 305,840 set in Q4 2021. In 2017, the average quarterly production volume of Tesla was a mere 25,000 cars. Today, it currently has the highest brand growth even outside of the automotive industry, showcasing a year-on-year growth of 184% in 2021.
So, the magic question: having seen their 2017 numbers compared to their 2021 statistics, how did Tesla successfully pull itself out of the “production hell”, gaining the title of “king of electric vehicles”? We explore some of the influences on Tesla’s growth below.
Tesla’s Smart Manufacturing Developments
The answer to the question of how Tesla managed such terrific numbers points to smart manufacturing and modern technologies.
Since 2014, Tesla has built six Gigafactories around the world to cut the costs of battery cells. The automotive manufacturer has implemented smart factories, where technologies such as devices, sensors, and robots are connected and work simultaneously together within an integrated system to produce cars and batteries more efficiently.
By housing production, assembly, and other phases of the process under one roof, the company can churn out products at a more competitive rate, while lowering the costs that would usually be incurred by using external production services. The structure’s massive roof is also covered in solar cells which allow the factory to produce its own energy.
The ultimate goal of Tesla is to build a fully autonomous electric vehicle. Whenever a Tesla goes into autopilot it sends data back to a cloud server from which Tesla learns how to improve the functionality. That knowledge then gets pushed back to the cars in software updates. A couple years ago, there was an incident where there was overheating causing issues in the engine’s operation. To fix the issue, a software was launched to patch up the problem. Since Tesla has already optimized its territory in the tech world, it is a given that they are currently utilizing the cloud and AI for autonomous driving capabilities.
Of course, not every manufacturer is Tesla, nor has this large a scale of operations or resources, but cloud computing is still a boon for manufacturers, especially for those who are looking to digitize and transform their production lines more efficiently.
Where Does the Cloud Come into Manufacturing?
It is also important to understand that the manufacturing industry has not been exempt from industry 4.0./the fourth industrial revolution. Rather, manufacturing has and will continue to play an important role in developments and continuity in various industries (e.g. growth in the rates of production as well as businesses that have sought to include sustainability in their manufacturing processes), which subsequently requires that manufacturing as an industry remain up to date itself. Cloud-based systems are just one of the ways in which manufacturers can process, store, and backup the wealth of data that they collect, and the further use of technologies such as software as, applications, and AI can be linked to their clouds to provide centralized integration and ease.
Additionally, development in areas such as advanced robotics, 3D printing, IoT, and more provides new areas for manufacturers to explore. Sangfor provides solutions for manufacturing industries, bringing revolutionary changes to their processes. Read some of the success stories on industry leading manufacturers.
Hybrid cloud solutions further provide the benefit of allowing manufacturers to integrate their infrastructure with the cloud, utilizing both on-premises hardware and cloud-based solutions as an innovative strategy for development. Cybersecurity and data protection are benefits of a hybrid cloud solution necessary for every organization seeking to protect their data and secure their networks.
Cloud as a solution might be imperative for manufacturers looking to keep upwith technologies that are creating value in the world.
Why Sangfor?
Sangfor cloud solution leverages its world-leading hyper-converged infrastructure platform and security capabilities to deliver secure private cloud, flexible managed cloud, and consistent hybrid cloud for customers on demand. Based on consistent cloud architecture, Sangfor cloud gives customers not only a simplified cloud infrastructure but also an easy-to-use business-centric digital platform. Several manufacturers across APAC and EMEA like Samsung, Toshiba, and Sony are adopting Sangfor’s cloud solution to transform their legacy data center infrastructure and improve their production efficiency. Contact Us to know more about Sangfor products and solutions for your cloud requirements.
Editor's Note: The purpose of this blog article is to describe how enterprises in the manufacturing industry can benefit from the cloud to enhance their productivity & innovation. Sangfor is not affiliated to or associated with Tesla.
