Battery cell shortage the key limiter in Tesla Semi deployment

First teased in Tesla’s 2016 'Master Plan’, the Tesla Semi has not quite followed the development and deployment roadmap initially laid out. As an original 2019 delivery date came and went, in June 2019 production was slated to instead begin by the end of 2020. Four months later, in Tesla’s October Q3 earnings call, Tesla doubled down on that timeline, albeit with a lower production target. The pandemic then led to an additional year’s delay. However, with late 2021 the new aim, it appears battery cell production capacity issues could yet push deployment even further out.