Increased production of the Tesla Roadster :)

The way I read it is that they're increasing production beyond ongoing demand, production will still stop in 2011, but they will build up an inventory that will allow sales into 2012. All that is not specifically stated, but it's what I think was implied.

TDave's interpretation sounds most likely to me.

If I were Tesla Motors, I would have Lotus pre-build a bunch of gliders in the most popular configurations their order history has shown. They can store a bunch of gliders in Menlo Park. The parking lot is huge.

The only issue is whether Tesla Motors has deep enough pockets to pre-build a few hundred gliders and then gradually use them in 2012 after the Lotus production line shuts down.

Tesla can likely handle about 300-500 per year now that the backlog is gone. I have nothing to back that up. Just a guess.

When the word gets out that production has stopped, the price will go up. Such backlog can be viewed as an investment. 50 million $ investment