Tesla’s production woes for its first mass-market vehicle are well documented. The company isn’t hiding the fact that it’s not producing near enough Model 3s to reach its ambitious targets. That’s partly due to the high demand for the more affordable sedan, but also because of manufacturing hiccups in the production line. CEO Elon Musk recently blamed those problems on an over-reliance on advanced automation.
Now he has a new solution for solving the robot problems: host a hackathon.
Hackathons are events where experts in certain fields, especially programmers, come together to solve an issue or create a product in a short amount of time, typically for prize money.
Musk said in a tweet Sunday that a hackathon was already underway to fix the two worst robot production chokepoints in the factory line. His tweet was in response to an article by Ars Technica that compares past mistakes by General Motors to automate production to Tesla’s current setup.
“Fair criticism, but we’re fixing it fast. Hackathon going on right now to fix 2 worst robot production chokepoints. Looks promising,” he tweeted. Musk did not say who was invited to the hackathon so it’s not clear whether subject-matter-experts or fans outside the company are also helping.
Fair criticism, but we’re fixing it fast. Hackathon going on right now to fix 2 worst robot production chokepoints. Looks promising.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 14, 2018
Tesla said in April that it fell short of reaching its 2,500 cars per week output goal by the end of Q1, making just 2,020 instead. That’s still four times the amount it produced in the last quarter of 2017. The company is still hopeful it can ramp up production to 5,000 Model 3s every week by the end of Q2. These goals were originally made for last year, but production issues set things back several months.
It’s only now starting to look up. It was reported Monday that Tesla delivered its first Model 3 outside of the U.S. to a customer in Canada. But there is still a lot of ground to cover to fill a backlog of around 400,000 reservations.
As Tesla struggles with the Model 3, it continues to push forward with a forthcoming crossover, the Model Y. Musk said the Model Y’s production system will be “dramatically better” than the one used for the Model 3. In fact, in classic Musk style, he said it would create a “manufacturing revolution.”