Polestar continues reporting Australian sales after industry body exit, will Tesla follow?
Polestar is independently reporting its monthly deliveries after exiting the car-maker lobby group which collates industry sales data. But it's not clear yet whether Tesla – which will also stop providing data to the industry reports from July – will do the same.
Polestar has begun publishing its sales data after exiting the new-car manufacturer lobby group that collates the car industry's monthly VFACTS reports following a disagreement over upcoming emissions rules for new vehicles.
Last month Polestar joined Tesla in renouncing its membership of the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries (FCAI), alleging the lobby group is trying to "deliberately slow" the reduction of emissions, and that it "cherrypicked [figures] ... to progress the position of only some members".
The exit means the Volvo-affiliated electric-car brand can no longer report its figures to the FCAI's monthly VFACTS sales reports, which are the car industry standard in Australia.
However the electric-car specialist has elected to continue to publish its sales data outside of VFACTS – in conjunction with the Electric Vehicle Council lobby group – reporting 84 deliveries in March 2024.
While it is a drop in the ocean compared to the other 10,464 electric vehicles reported as sold last month, the brand is due to launch two SUVs later this year which are expected to give its sales a boost.
It is unclear if Tesla will follow Polestar in reporting its sales data independently, as the US electric-car giant has confirmed it will cease reporting sales to VFACTS reports after June 30.
Prior to the publication of its first VFACTS sales data in March 2022, Tesla distributed its results for calendar-year 2021 through the Electric Vehicle Council.
However it took two attempts to publish the correct figures as the data initially supplied by Tesla to the lobby group "erroneously" included 2020 results – in addition to 2021.
As a result the figure published was about 3000 deliveries higher than the figure exclusively published by Drive, based on state and territory registration data – before the Electric Vehicle Council issued a correction about 24 hours later.
Drive has contacted Tesla Australia to confirm the company's plans for the publication of its sales data after it ceases reporting to VFACTS at the end of June.
This story will be updated if a response is received.
In March 2024, Tesla reported 6017 new vehicles as delivered – placing it sixth overall, ahead of Hyundai, Nissan, Isuzu and MG, but behind Toyota, Ford, Mazda, Mitsubishi and Kia.
The US car maker accounted for 57 per cent of new electric vehicles reported as sold last month.
If Tesla Australia elects to withhold its sales data after its final VFACTS report – and not publish its figures independently – policymakers in Canberra will no longer have a true understanding of the demand for electric cars locally.
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