Chevy Bolt EV costs $28,700 to build, Tesla Model 3 a bit higher

"Now we have an estimate of the company's production costs for an entire 2017 Chevy Bolt EV, from a report issued by the investment firm UBS.

It's not limited to the Bolt EV, either; the company also projects what it thinks a Tesla Model 3 will cost to manufacture.

It's worth reading the entire report to understand the company's methods and reasoning.

The bottom line, however, is that UBS has calculated the production and manufacturing cost of a Chevrolet Bolt EV at $28,700."
- Chevy Bolt EV costs $28,700 to build, Tesla Model 3 a bit higher: analysis
They report the Bolt is losing $7400 if 30k at sold.

 

To lose money, the accounting factors in the fixed costs like R&D. A company needs to invest in such in order to stay competitive, but the numbers can be applied to produce negative talking points. The more Bolts GM sells, the lower amount of those costs each car has to bear. The $7400 in losses is based upon only selling 30k cars. If current sales stay steady, that many Bolts will be sold by the middle of next year, leaving three and half years of sales to further spread those costs out with a normal generation cycle.

The actual report may not of addressed the value to GM of selling Bolts to ZEV and CAFE regulations. So the Bolt balance sheet may look even better to them. Then some of the Bolt R&D, like the simpler, cheaper battery packaging, will get applied to future models.

The main take away of the article is that the estimated costs are in line with other, brand new car models, and selling a Bolt isn't a liability like FCA's CEO claimed about the 500e.

 

I haven't gone through the actual report myself, but yes. The $28,700 is just what it costs to build one Bolt. Things like R&D and factory tooling aren't included because they were paid for before production began, which means those costs are directly tied to the production of an individual car. They can be applied to the individual cars for the purposes of paying of the investment they were, but that amount per car is going to vary with the number of cars sold. The cost of labor, material, and energy to goes into figuring the $28.7k production cost are pretty much a fixed amount per unit.

@bwilson4web posted another article on this subject in the News section. Even with the announcement that GM is losing money on the Bolt, the UBS report was positive for BEVs.
"What they found led them to make this rather startling announcement: the “total cost of consumer ownership [of electric cars] can reach parity with combustion engines from 2018.” Notice that doesn’t mean an electric car and a conventional car will cost the same to buy new. It means they will cost the same to own, figuring in maintenance, cost of fuel, insurance, and all the other factors that are part of the total cost of ownership.

The UBS study goes on to say, “This will create an inflection point for demand. We raise our 2025 forecast for EV sales by 50% to 14.2 million — 14% of global car sales.”"
- UBS: Chevy Bolt Powertrain $4,600 Cheaper Than Thought, Tesla Model 3 Likely To Be Profitable | CleanTechnica

 

No idea, but banks do have multiple departments. The guys writing this report may not be greedy, evil bastards.

 

Can't say until I've actually read the report, their view might be more pragmatic on EVs. Before, their predictions on future EV sales were more pessimistic. They just now concluded that the Bolt and Model 3 are approaching the point were a BEV will equal a traditional ICE car in total ownership costs.

The report is good news for EV advocates, but that doesn't mean the authors hold a preference one way or the other.