Palo Alto, California-headquartered electric vehicle maker Tesla has selected SK Lubricants as the sole provider of gearbox oil for its Model 3 electric sedan that comes out later next year, industry sources said on July 1.
Since 2013, SK Lubricants has supplied an annual 80,000 liters of gearbox oil to Tesla for its Model S, shared with other lubricant suppliers, but this is the first time that the company has become a sole provider to the electric vehicle manufacturer.
With the addition of the new Model 3 lubricant volume, SKs supply is expected to almost double to approximately 140,000 liters annually. Taking into consideration that Tesla has announced it would increase its Model 3 production to some 500,000 vehicles by 2020 (this is 10 times higher than the 50,000 cars, models S and X combined, Tesla delivered in 2015), the total lubricant quantity could surge to 2 million liters per year if SK Lubricants remains the sole supplier. Tesla plans to produce 200,000 Model 3 sedans by the second half of next year, after receiving more than 350,000 pre-orders for its Model 3 sedan.
SK Lubricants currently supplies oil to General Motors, Renault Nissan, Hyundai Motor and Kia Motors.
