The move is largely symbolic, but carries a strong business argument as Tesla matures as a manufacturing company and pushes toward launching its first pickup truck.
Tesla picked up the Fremont plant in 2010, paying just over $40 million for a factory that had been jointly operating by General Motors and Toyota .NUMMI is a large plant and has served an expanding Tesla's needs quite well as the company has expanded Nobody in their right industrial mind would put a new car plant in California, so Tesla was an outlier. And now the company has somewhat corrected the imbalance with its Texas ambitions. That plant, Musk has said, will serve the eastern half of the US, but more importantly, it will be where the forthcoming Cybertruck is going to be built, right in the heart of pickup-truck-making country .
You'd also assume that Musk would take an interest in supervising, as much as he's able, Tesla's first "clean sheet" US factory — a corrective to everything that's wrong, from a production standpoint, with Fremont. Musk wants Tesla to go down in history for reinventing manufacturing, and the Austin-area plant should be the first chapter.
If you're smarter than a 5th grader, you wouldn't move to TExas. You would move all your money to an offshore account, establish headquarters in a strong currency country, and then use Asian labor and sell it to America for a higher price. Cheaper taxes/moving is old fashion.
UAW
I can’t imagine he has much of a choice, long term
he literally moved so he wouldn't have to comply with covid rules...
Publicity? I doubt it when Tesla doesn’t waste money on marketing. And if so, that’s business.
It also about reducing his tax burden. California has the highest state income tax in the country. Taxes has no state income tax.
California is no place for an automaker, they need to produce in states where production costs for an industrial company r lower (people, real estate). California is for tech, few smart people writing software. While succesful at associating itself w new economy, Tesla is no tech
He is a giant!