Elon Musk has held out the prospect of Tesla achieving “a few million” in annual car sales by 2025, even as reports of a slowdown in China sales sent shares in the electric car company down more than 7 per cent in after-hours trading.
报告显示特斯拉在华销量增长放缓，导致这家电动汽车公司股价在盘后交易中下跌逾7%。尽管如此，这家加州集团的共同创始人埃隆•马斯克(Elon Musk)仍然预期，在2025年以前，特斯拉年度汽车销量或将达到“几百万辆”。

Speaking at an event on the sidelines of the Detroit motor show, the co-founder of the Californian group also said that he believed Tesla could achieve profitability by the end of the decade, as it seeks to prove that the economics behind electric vehicles can work.
在底特律车展会场外的一次活动中，马斯克还表示他相信特斯拉会在2019年底以前盈利。目前，特斯拉一直试图证明电动汽车背后的经济模式是有效的。
“Our mission is fundamentally to transition the world to electric cars,” said Mr Musk. “So if we don’t make a lot of cars, we’re not doing the best that we can.”
马斯克表示：“我们的使命是从根本上让世界转向电动汽车。因此，如果我们不生产大量车辆，我们就未尽全力。”
But the bullish outlook — which pitches Tesla as a company achieving sales on a par with BMW — was overshadowed after Mr Musk told reporters in Detroit that the carmaker’s sales in China were “unexpectedly weak” during the fourth quarter.
这一信心十足的展望将特斯拉定位为销量可与宝马(BMW)匹敌的企业。然而，就在底特律，马斯克告诉记者，去年第四季度特斯拉在华销量“出乎意料地低迷”，这一消息令上述展望蒙上了一层阴影。
He said that while there had been “significant” increases in European and North American demand, China had suffered because of “some misperception issues” on the subject of home charging.
他说，尽管欧洲和北美的需求曾“大幅增长”，由于在家用充电问题上的“某些误解问题”，特斯拉在中国却遭遇困境。
Tesla’s shares were down 7 per cent in after-hours trading at $189.95.
消息传来，在盘后交易中，特斯拉股票下跌7%，跌至每股189.95美元。
Tesla is working hard to bring a mass market equivalent of its Model S premium saloon to market. Mr Musk said that once the $35,000 vehicle, known as the Model 3, was up to full production by 2020, the lossmaking company would be in the black.
目前，特斯拉正在努力将其S型豪华轿车的大众版推向市场。马斯克表示，一旦这款售价3.5万美元、被称为3型轿车的产品在2020年以前全面投产，处于亏损状态的特斯拉将会盈利。
“I think we will at some point start showing a profit,” he said. “We feel pretty comfortable saying 2020.”
他说：“我认为，从某一时刻起，公司将开始盈利。对此，十分保守的估计是2020年。”
That vision depends on wider adoption of electric vehicles. The category is expected to still make up only about 1 per cent of vehicles by the end of the decade.
这一图景有赖于电动汽车的更广泛应用。不过，到这个十年结束前，预计电动汽车占所有汽车的比例仍将只有大约1%。
But there are signs that mainstream carmakers are ramping up efforts to produce affordable and practical electric vehicles as they seek to meet stringent CO2 emissions targets.
然而，多种迹象表明，为满足苛刻的二氧化碳排放目标，主流汽车制造商都加大了研发力度，生产廉价而实用的电动汽车。
Mr Musk was speaking a day after General Motors stole a march on rivals at the Detroit motor show by unveiling a battery electric concept car with a targeted price tag of $30,000.
就在马斯克发表这番讲话一天前，在底特律车展上，通用汽车(General Motors)悄然抢占先机，披露了一款以电池电力推动的概念车，其目标价位定为3万美元。
“Musk continues to show optimism in the electric car market, paired with his ongoing encouragement for other automakers to join him in replacing the internal combustion engine with battery power,” said Karl Brauer, senior analyst at Kelley Blue Book’s KBB.com. “Now it looks like he’s getting his wish.”
凯利蓝皮书旗下kbb.com网站资深分析师卡尔•布劳尔(Karl Brauer)表示：“对于电力汽车市场，马斯克依然表现得十分乐观。与此同时，他也在不断鼓励其他汽车制造商加入他的行列，以电池动力取代内燃机。如今，他似乎正在实现他的愿望。”
Mr Musk used the appearance late on Tuesday to urge mainstream carmakers to speed up the development of electric vehicles to get the industry to a point where widespread adoption was possible.
此外，马斯克还把周二晚些时候的现身作为契机，敦促主流汽车制造商加快开发电动汽车，以便令该行业达到有可能被人们广泛接受的临界点。
“It’s only going to go there if the big carmakers make risky decisions to make electric vehicles . . . which is sort of counter-intuitive, because, why do we want all these competitors?”
“只有大型汽车制造商决心冒着风险生产电动汽车，整个行业才能到达这一临界点……这有些违背直觉，原因是，我们为何会盼望出现这么多竞争者？”
He added that the need for zero-emission technology was ever more important, given the sharp fall in the oil price that has pushed US consumers towards heavy-duty pick-up trucks and sport utility vehicles.
他补充说，考虑到油价大幅下跌将大量美国消费者推向重型皮卡和运动型多功能车，零排放技术的必要性正变得前所未有地重要。
“The need for sustainable transport is incredibly high. Even in the face of massively declining oil prices, I think it actually becomes more urgent that [we make that] transition to electric,” said Mr Musk, who is also co-founder of space flight company SpaceX. “I think that all transport, with the ironic exception of rockets, will go fully electric.”
马斯克表示：“可持续性运输的必要性之高令人难以置信。我认为，尽管正面临油价暴跌，（我们）向电动汽车的转型其实更紧迫了。我认为，所有运输方式都应该完全使用电力——除了火箭这样的所谓特例之外。”之所以会这么说，因为马斯克也是太空飞行公司SpaceX的共同创始人。