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MINI-CASE ON TESLA, INC. (TSLA) WHAT AMERICAN COMPANY DOES THE BEST JOB OF STRATEGIC PLANNING, AND HOW IS IT DONE? The answer to the first part of the question posed may be Tesla Inc., the U.S. electric automobile manufacturer founded in 2003 and headquartered in Palo Alto, California. The answer to the second part of the question may be “by matching internal strengths/weaknesses with external opportunity! A New Tesla Anybody? threats” using SWOT analysis. For the first time ever, in 2017, Tesla joined the Fortune 500 largest companies in the United States, the company’s annual revenues exceed $7 billion. An integral part of Tesla’s excellent strategic plan is to capitalize on the 6.5 percent annual gross domestic product (GDP) growth in China, compared to the GDP growth of about 2 percent in the United States. Tesla’s sales in China skyrocketed in recent years as CEO Elon Musk of Tesla capitalizes heavily on the firm’s technological prowess (internal strength) matched with China’s booming GDP (external opportunity) and China’s strong preference for electric vehicles (external opportunity). In 2016, sales of electric and plug-in hybrid automobiles in China rose 50 percent to 507,000, more than triple the comparable figure in the United States. Electric vehicles are viewed in China as a way to help clear smoggy skies (an external opportunity), and that is a primary reason why China’s government has ex- empted electric cars from rigid license plate restrictions in six large cities: Shanghai, Beijing, Shenzhen, Hangzhou, Guangzhou, and Tianjin; these six cities report the highest Tesla sales. Tesla’s strategic plan includes manufacturing cars China by the end of 2018, because shipping cars from California to China is costly. Tariffs and taxes incurred to export cars to China increases the price of Tesla sedans and SUVs by 50 percent (external threat). The number of electric vehi- cle charging stations in China exceeds one thousand (external opportunity). Tesla mass produces its STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT Model X SUV because China’s obsession with SUVs is a decade old and growing rapidly. Sales of SUVs in China now comprise nearly 40 percent of all passenger-vehicle sales in that country. Turning to Australia, Tesla recently supplied the largest battery in the world to Jamestown, Aus- tralia. The battery is storing electricity from a new wind farm that supplies thirty thousand homes with power. The battery has a 100-megawatt capacity. Tesla’s strategic plan is for the whole world to use its batteries in cars, trucks, homes, and businesses.