Tesla is starting to hire in the Philippines – hinting at an imminent launch the Southeast Asian market.
From the introduction of the Roadster to the Model Y, Tesla had a rapid global expansion into many new markets, but as it coverage expanded globally, its launches in new markets have greatly slowed down.
Tesla is now in most major auto markets around the world with the exception of a few, like India, which wasn’t from a lack of trying.
The automaker has yet to launch primarily in Africa and South America, and it has yet to establish a presence in a few Asian markets.
Now, Tesla is addressing this issue in a Southeast Asian market: The Philippines.
Tesla has listed 15 job openings in Taguig, a city near the Manilla metropolitan area. Here are a few:
Most of the jobs are related to deploying a sales and service operation as well as home charging solutions.
When entering a new market, Tesla typically first deploys its Supercharger network in order to enable long-distance travel, but Tesla’s Supercharger map currently doesn’t show any upcoming station, nor does any of the job listings imply Supercharger deployment.
The Philipines represents a relatively small auto market with about 440,000 car deliveries last year. It is dominated by Japanese automakers, especially Toyota, which holds a massive 45% market share and has 8 of the top 10 best-selling cars in the country.
There are already a few electric cars for sale in the Philippines, especially from Chinese manufacturers like BYD.
Electrek’s Take
It likely won’t be a super impactful market for Tesla, considering the size of the auto market, but it is one more market where Tesla can send some capacity from Gigafactory Shanghai after seeing its demand in Europe drop.
Tesla exports a good amount of its Chinese EV production to Europe, but sales have been down this year, and it is expected to continue as Tesla faces tariffs for vehicles imported from China to Europe.
It will be interesting to see how receptive the Philipines will be to Tesla vehicles.
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