Elon Musk is joining President Donald Trump’s delegation for the May 13-15 state visit to Beijing, Bloomberg reported on Monday — adding the Tesla chief executive to a scaled-back CEO contingent for the first US presidential trip to China in nearly nine years.
The delegation also reportedly includes Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon, Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg, Citigroup CEO Jane Fraser, Blackstone CEO Steve Schwarzman, and executives from Exxon Mobil, Visa, and Mastercard.
It is a markedly smaller business contingent than the 29 corporate executives who accompanied Trump on his November 2017 Beijing visit during the US President’s first term.
 Tesla’s Giga Shanghai factory remains its single most important manufacturing asset globally — accounting for approximately 60% of Tesla’s Q1 2026 deliveries — while domestic Chinese retail sales have fallen for a second consecutive month in April.
The FSD Approval
Full regulatory approval for Tesla’s Full Self-Driving software in China remains the central commercial prize Musk is pursuing on this trip.
Musk told Tesla’s annual shareholder meeting in November last year that Chinese authorities had indicated full FSD approval could come “around February or March” 2026.
That timeline has slipped.
Company executives now expect approval in Q3 2026, as EV previously reported, after the February-March window passed without regulatory action.
Tesla has built substantial local infrastructure to satisfy Chinese regulatory requirements.
The company operates a Shanghai data centre established in 2021 to keep vehicle data inside China, a mapping partnership with Baidu signed during Musk’s April 2024 Beijing visit, and a local AI training centre that began operations in early 2026 to train neural networks domestically rather than relying on US-based Dojo clusters.
The FSD package currently sells in China for 62,000 yuan ($9,100), though most customers do not purchase it because the software remains effectively unusable under current regulatory restrictions.
Tesla introduced what it locally calls “Autopilot automatic assisted driving on urban roads” in China in February 2025, but the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology subsequently banned the use of terms like “autonomous driving” or “full self-driving” in marketing materials.
The company rebranded the feature to “Intelligent Assisted Driving” in response.
Musk’s Recent Public China Commentary
Musk’s public commentary on China has been consistently positive.
In a March 5 post on X, the Tesla CEO wrote that “China is doing incredibly well building solar + batteries for power and EVs for transport” and added that this was “Something the rest of the world should do.”
Three days later, Musk wrote that “China is rapidly reducing dependence on oil.”
On March 19, he framed the global AI competition in geographically split terms: “Google will win the AI race in the West, China on Earth and SpaceX in space.”
On April 20, Musk specifically addressed the Tesla-China commercial relationship in a reply on X about FSD: “This is before supervised FSD is approved in China. Limiting factor is production output in Shanghai.”
Musk made a surprise April 2024 visit to Beijing where he met Premier Li Qiang and secured the Baidu mapping partnership, and was met by Chinese Vice President Han Zheng in Washington in January 2025 — just before Trump’s inauguration.
The Trump-Musk Backdrop
Musk’s inclusion in the Beijing delegation follows a turbulent year in his relationship with Trump.
The Tesla CEO led the Department of Government Efficiency through Trump’s first months in office, departing on May 30, 2025, after hitting the 130-day “special government employee” cap.
Days after his departure, Musk publicly clashed with Trump over the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, calling the legislation a “disgusting abomination” and briefly floating the formation of an “America Party” to challenge Republican incumbents.
The relationship reconciled through the second half of 2025, with Musk attending a White House dinner for Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in November and resuming financial support for Republican congressional candidates ahead of the 2026 midterms.
Bloomberg reported on January 15 that the relationship was showing “new signs of a thaw.”
Musk participated in a March phone call between Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, an unusual inclusion of a private citizen on a head-of-state call during the Iran war.
What’s on the Beijing Agenda
The Trump-Xi summit agenda spans trade, technology export controls, rare earth supply chains, AI competition, Taiwan, the Iran war, and managed-trade structures.
Boeing is reportedly close to securing China’s first major aircraft order since 2017 — potentially 500 737 MAX jets plus dozens of widebody aircraft.
Beijing is seeking at least a one-year extension of the October 2025 trade truce that paused retaliatory export controls; Washington is asking for six months.
Chinese negotiators also want the Trump administration to commit to rolling back existing controls on chipmaking equipment and advanced memory chips, according to people briefed on summit preparations.
For Tesla specifically, the summit could accelerate three commercial priorities: full FSD regulatory approval, robotaxi pilot authorisation, and Optimus humanoid robot localisation potential at Shanghai.
Tesla’s China Numbers
Tesla’s Shanghai factory exported a record 53,522 vehicles in April, up 80% year-on-year and 81% month-on-month, according to data released by the China Passenger Car Association on Monday.
The export surge pushed Shanghai wholesale output to 79,478 vehicles for the month — the strongest April figure on record.
Year-to-date Shanghai exports through April stand at 154,122 vehicles, a 127% increase from the same period in 2025.
Domestic Chinese retail sales tell a different story.
Tesla’s April retail sales in China stood at 25,956 vehicles, down 9.66% year-on-year and down 53.74% from March, when domestic deliveries hit 56,107 units amid a seasonal rebound.
Cumulative January-April retail sales totalled 138,754 vehicles, a 15.05% drop from the same period last year.
Tesla’s overall China new energy vehicle market share fell to 3% in April, the weakest level since November 2025, as Chinese rivals including BYD, XPeng, and Xiaomi accelerated price-competitive launches.
The retail-versus-wholesale gap is structural: 67% of Shanghai’s April output was exported, masking the underlying weakness in Chinese consumer demand.
Tesla’s full-year 2025 China retail sales fell roughly 5% — the first annual decline since Giga Shanghai began operations.
The decline accelerated to a 16% Q1 2026 crash, with January retail sales collapsing 45% year-on-year to 18,485 units, the lowest monthly figure in over three years.
