Tesla, General Motors (GM) and Toyota are the best-placed vehicle manufacturers to benefit from the automotive industry’s continued recovery from pandemic slowdown in 2021, according to a new study by GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

Set against a range of strategic and operational data sets, these three companies came out on top. The study utilised four indices for the operational measure and five for the strategic measure. Each of the contributing indices were given equal weighting in the overall operational and strategic scores.

Calum MacRae, Automotive Analyst at GlobalData, comments: “Tesla, followed by GM, Toyota and Hyundai came out on top for operational leadership. Strategically, the highest rated company of those assessed was demonstrated to be VW, with Toyota, Tesla, Ford and GM in pursuit.”

Under the operational metrics were: sales footprint alignment; margin resilience; capacity utilization and financial sentiment. Strategic metrics were: jobs; patents in electrical vehicles; SUV share; CASE deals and average volume per platform.

MacRae adds: “Tesla scored very highly on the operational metrics and is clearly riding high as it ramps up production and taps into rising demand for electric vehicles. GM, too, is doing well and it’s the operational metrics that will most obviously feed into short-term performance prospects into 2021. The companies that tend to take a long view with investment strategies are positioned well there, including Volkswagen and Toyota, in particular.”