Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) suffered another setback as it missed its vehicle delivery target for the second consecutive quarter.
Tesla – led by billionaire Elon Musk – delivered 14,370 vehicles in the three months to June, down on the 17,000 it expected to deliver in the quarter.
The firm said an unusually large number of cars were still in transit to customers, while it also blamed the “extreme” ramp-up in production which led to almost half of the quarter’s vehicle being made in the final few weeks.
Tesla delivered 29,190 cars in the first six months of this year and expects to deliver a further 50,000 in the second half.
Even if it hits the 50,000 target, the company will still fall just short of its earlier expectation that it will deliver between 80,000 and 90,000 vehicles this year.
The miss on its delivery targets is the latest setback in recent weeks for Tesla.
The electric vehicle company’s offer to buy solar energy firm SolarCity Corp. (NASDAQ:SCTY) – another of Musk’s ventures – got a mixed reception from shareholders at the end of last month.
Last week, it came out that a Tesla Model S had been involved in a fatal crash while the driver was using the autopilot feature.
This was the first known incident of its kind, with the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration now investigating 25,000 of the Model S cars that have the Autopilot system.
Shares in Tesla were down US$7.11, or 3.3%, to US$209.39 in pre-market trading.