SHANGHAI—Tesla Inc. has been summoned by the Chinese authorities in response to consumer complaints about quality issues with its electric vehicles, a rare official rebuke for Tesla in China, where the company has expanded rapidly with the support of the authorities.
The State Administration for Market Regulation, China’s top market regulator, said Monday that it had instructed Tesla
TSLA,
Some of China’s biggest state-owned banks have been instrumental in funding Tesla’s operations in the country, lending the company roughly $2.36 billion in 2019 and 2020 as it constructed, and then expanded, its Shanghai plant.
Tesla recently recalled 36,126 Model S and Model X vehicles imported from the U.S. because of touch-screen problems, according to a separate SAMR statement issued on Friday. That followed the recall of 48,442 imported Model S and X cars in China in October over concerns about faulty suspension systems.
An expanded version of this report appears on WSJ.com.
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