(Yicai Global) May 5 -- Production capacity at Tesla’s Shanghai gigafactory is expected to return to the level seen before the latest outbreak of Covid-19 in the Chinese city by the middle of this month, sources familiar with the matter told Yicai Global.

The US electric carmaker resumed production at the Shanghai plant on April 19 and capacity is at about one-third of the pre-outbreak level. Only 10,000 Tesla vehicles rolled off the factory’s assembly line last month.

“The top priority now is to hike capacity as soon as possible,” a Tesla insider told Yicai Global. “We still have a backlog of orders that have not been produced and delivered.” A salesperson with Tesla also said buyers will have to wait at least six months for delivery if they order now.

Tesla halted operations at the plant, located in the Lingang New Area of Shanghai’s free trade zone, for about six days in March due to the impact of the Covid-19 flare-up, turning out just over 55,460 cars in March, per statistics from the China Passenger Car Association.

“We did lose a lot of important days of production, but Tesla Shanghai gigafactory is coming back with a vengeance,” Chief Executive Elon Musk said on a recent earnings call. He predicted record weekly production at the factory this quarter, meaning second-quarter output would be similar to the first quarter.

“We’re confident about China’s development and believe that the Covid-19 epidemic is only an interim challenge,” said Tao Lin, Tesla’s global vice president. “We’ve also noticed the capabilities of various industries to cope with the challenges during the production resumption and believe operations will be back to normal very soon.”

But stable production can only be assured when many suppliers resume operations, he added. Tesla has handed a list of its more than 100 suppliers in the automotive industry chain to the Shanghai authorities, so that they can help the suppliers resolve problems such as logistics.

Tesla supplier Aptiv has said that the capacity of its Shanghai plants, including those for connectors and cable harnesses, is back to 50 percent to 60 percent of normal levels.

Editor: Futura Costaglione