Tesla delivery numbers for the quarter fell short of chief executive officer (CEO) Elon Musk's target of 100,000 cars delivered.
For the three months ending in September, Tesla announced that it delivered about 97,000 cars, missing the 100,000 delivery target set by Musk. Despite falling short of the target, this is still a record delivery for the company, increasing from the 95,200 and 63,000 cars it delivered in the past two quarters.
This is also in line with Wall Street analysts projection of 97,500 units.
Last week, Musk sent an email telling employees that he expects the company to have 110,000 orders for the quarter and aims to delivery as many as possible by September 30. The company's stock fell by 4% in after-hours trading on October 2.
Tesla had to face several obstacles in its initiative to reach the delivery milestone, including making sure that its distribution network was properly equipped. In the email, Musk wrote that the "challenge is making sure that we have the right car variants in the right locations and rallying as much as our company resources as possible to help with the end of the quarter deliveries."
The company will be heading into the fourth quarter with an order backlog and will focus on "increasing production to meet that demand." Tesla has set a guidance of between 360,000 and 400,000 deliveries for 2019 but not hitting the third quarter target would make it difficult for the company to reach the low end of that guidance.
According to Deutsche Bank analysts, the company would need to reach an even higher delivery target of 104,800 just to reach the 360,000 estimate.
While the higher delivery numbers helped slash Tesla's operating loss, the company's overall gross margins for automobiles fell slightly and it posted a quarterly loss of $408 million. This is contrary to the company's goal of posting a positive net income in the third quarter.
