
Tesla plans to build a new car factory in Texas - rbanffy
https://arstechnica.com/cars/2020/05/report-tesla-plans-to-build-a-new-car-factory-in-texas/
======
IfOnlyYouKnew
Isn't this just Elon Musk getting into one of his superfluous fights, only
this time California being the somewhat-random opponent? Musk has been
completely unhinged the last few weeks, and it doesn't seem to be wise making
such large decisions in anger, especially considering the reason for his anger
is, even if justified, unlikely to reoccur.

I'm quite the Musk fanboy, but he's always had this very strange anger
issue... It's not even getting in fights that I find troubling. But for the
genius that he is, these squabbles just seem...pedestrian? Calling people
pedophiles or going five rounds with SEC for no reason at all?

For comparison, I hate Peter Thiel with a passion. But finding some plaintiff
and funding the lawsuit that bankrupts the news organisation that wronged you,
for something entirely different? That's how you should win stupid fights when
your day job is rockets, fire-throwers, and revolutionary sports cars.

If his recent "red pill" comments is a sign of what's to come, he might be
stretching his luck. Going full alt-right MAGA is going to cut his customer
base in half, at least in the US and Europe.

~~~
sangnoir
> Going full alt-right MAGA is going to cut his customer base in half, at
> least in the US and Europe.

Putting my best effort to be charitable here: he could be opening up a whole
new market that is opposed to tree-huggers, fuel efficiency and Priuses. Texas
_loves_ trucks, the Cybertruck will be henceforth known as the _Freedom_
Cybertruck and the Texas Edition will come with a complementary "Come and take
it" sticker.

"Southern Heritage" flag interior design & center console wallpaper will be a
paid extra.

~~~
dpau
this is an awesome take- musk has been playing 4d chess all along, getting
hard-core conservatives to buy into renewable energy..

~~~
testbot123
This is a very charitable interpretation of Elon Musk's recent outbursts.

~~~
dpau
tongue in cheek. lately musk has reminded me not to have heros :(

~~~
Fjolsvith
Slightly off topic, but has anyone seen Amazon's new anti-hero series, "The
Boys"? Talk about taking the Batman vs Superman theme exponential. Wow!

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outside1234
"But Musk is said to want to start construction extremely soon and aims to
have Model Y vehicles coming out of the plant by the end of the year."

That is just delusional.

~~~
eloff
I think the rule with Elon Musk is all his estimates are extremely optimistic
and you need to multiply them by two or three to get closer to reality.

But I'm sure it serves a purpose in giving his employees an aggressive target
to aim at. Even if they miss it, at least they probably got there sooner.

~~~
ardy42
> But I'm sure it serves a purpose in giving his employees an aggressive
> target to aim at. Even if they miss it, at least they probably got there
> sooner.

That only works until the employees quickly realize the estimates are
impossible bullshit, and stop taking them seriously.

~~~
trianglem
Well that’s where management steps in and doesn’t let you disregard the
deadline. It makes for a miserable work experience but you can probably
achieve a lot that way.

~~~
ardy42
> Well that’s where management steps in and doesn’t let you disregard the
> deadline. It makes for a miserable work experience but you can probably
> achieve a lot that way.

That's the kind of management that would go whip the sea for disobedience.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xerxes_I#Invasion_of_the_Greek...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xerxes_I#Invasion_of_the_Greek_mainland)

> According to the Greek historian Herodotus, Xerxes's first attempt to bridge
> the Hellespont ended in failure when a storm destroyed the flax and papyrus
> cables of the bridges. In retaliation, Xerxes ordered the Hellespont (the
> strait itself) whipped three hundred times, and had fetters thrown into the
> water.

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cobookman
I get the feeling this was already planned. Freemont doesn't have much spare
land to increase manufacturing capacity. California has to be more expensive
(Labor, Regulations) than manufacturing in Texas.

Even if you'd need to fly your R&D team between Texas and California, you'd
still be saving money

~~~
justin66
In some vague "regulations" way, possibly, but the published hourly rates of
Tesla Fremont workers are not especially high. (I just googled the average as
being less than twenty dollars, which can't possibly be right, but I do
remember the figure being low by autoworker standards)

The thought that they might pay even less in Texas is depressing.

~~~
lukevp
$20/hr for blue collar work in a lot of Texas is very high. For example,
Amazon was paying $12/hr in the San Marcos facility until they raised wages
recently, and that was considered decent pay. $8-10/hr is pretty common for
unskilled labor here. We have a lot of tech and oil and gas that influences
the average income but tons of people here are working for way less than
$20/hr.

~~~
bdcravens
Yeah, $10-15/hour for a lot of non-skilled labor or even low-qualification
desk jobs is typical in the Houston area. The average home price here is
1/13th that of Fremont, to say nothing of areas outside of major cities.

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reaperducer
_Hours after Electrek 's story ran, three news organizations—TechCrunch, CNBC,
and the Associated Press—all published stories stating that Tesla was still
considering Tulsa, Oklahoma._

Tulsa is a better choice for one reason: Being able to say "Tesla Tulsa." Or
"The Tulsa Teslas." Or "I wanna test a Tulsa Tesla."

Maybe instead of a tax break, the city could offer to change its name to
Tesla. Cities have changed names for sillier reasons.

~~~
m463
Or maybe being able to actually buy a Tesla, as opposed to Texas:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_US_dealership_disputes#T...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_US_dealership_disputes#Texas)

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Cactus2018
Building a factory in Texas worked for Toyota
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Motor_Manufacturing_Tex...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Motor_Manufacturing_Texas)

~~~
gok
Not entirely coincidentally, Telsa's current factory in California is a former
Toyota plant.

~~~
bdcravens
They also briefly partnered with Toyota on a Rav4:

[https://www.tesla.com/blog/tesla-notifies-sec-agreement-
toyo...](https://www.tesla.com/blog/tesla-notifies-sec-agreement-toyota-
develop-electric-version-rav4)

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pplante
Elon aims to be producing cars from the new factory by end of year. Is it
possible that when he says factory they mean the tent structures they are
using and continuing to build in Fremont? If so, then maybe his timeline isn't
terribly far from reality. I agree that EOY might be ambitious, but by summer
2021 might not be. It all depends on the structure they build to meet that
goal.

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akmarinov
Will they be able to sell the cars from that factory directly to end users
without dealerships in Texas?

~~~
S_A_P
Would it be any different than how it is currently? I think it really could
just reduce transportation cost I suppose?

~~~
akmarinov
Not really? They still have to ship them out of Texas to another state that
will allow them to sell directly. Then customers will have to drive back to
Texas.

~~~
burlesona
That seems like the kind of thing Texas might change if Tesla does actually
move production there in a major way.

~~~
sunflowerfly
Not likely. Crony capitalism that helps the major car dealership owners but
limits economic progress For all. Collectively, these owners will likely
donate far more to political campaigns to keep the rules in place than Musk
can.

~~~
jcims
From my experience Texas is all about Texas and there are few states they love
to shit on more than California.

Are you telling me that if they bring a plant into Texas and start churning
out cars with 'Made In Texas' on every one of them, that there isn't going to
be a mutiny on whatever bullshit economic contraption was used to rationalize
not directly selling products Made In California?

You might be right, who knows, but I wouldn't bet on it.

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yalogin
IF the recession economists are predicting ends up happening it has to make a
significant dent in Tesla's sales right? Wonder how all of this will pan out
then. I guess building the factory is still needed, recession or not. So they
keep at it.

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omgwtfbyobbq
Eh, I think low volume Y production by the end of the year is possible, but
it's unlikely.

On one hand, they don't need to do as much as they did in Giga Shangahi
because they already have the Model Y specific bits in Fremont, which they can
ship to the new factory.

They just need to replicate all the Model 3 stuff the Model Y uses from Giga
Shanghai and install the Model Y specific stuff they ship in from Fremont,
which should be faster than Giga Shanghai.

On the other hand, they only have 6 months left to do this and we're in the
middle of a pandemic.

What people neglect to consider is that Tesla now owns Perbix and Grohmann,
which is very advantageous when building new factories.

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eggsnbacon1
Texas is probably the best place to build trucks for PR value. "Texas edition"
is something they even put on trucks made in Mexico. Texas is seen as strong
and independent, values respected by much of the customer base. To be less
politically correct, "Made in California" will definitely hurt sales for some
of the redneck demographic.

Its great economy doesn't hurt either. Unlike cars, there's not a strong value
in having these trucks on the coast near export terminals. Non-commercial
trucks are very much a US thing. And even more a Deep South thing.

~~~
m463
I think Texas aligns well with the size and outrageousness of the cybertruck.

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gibolt
Their goal is to begin assembly, much like Fremont's tent. Shanghai is
producing many of the parts in-house requiring a much more robust set of
tooling, supply chain, and overall clean, enclosed space

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gregimba
I'm picturing the new Cybertruck will sport the same sticker the Tundra's did
when they were made in Texas.

Born in Texas built by Texans.

~~~
TheBlight
Aren't the Tundras still made in San Antonio? IIRC they also contain the most
parts fabricated in the US of any pickup in class. (Disclosure: Don't work for
Toyota nor own stock but I do own a Tundra.)

~~~
gregimba
Looks like I was incorrect, they were planning to shift production to Mexico
in 2017 but didn't.

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yumraj
I really hope that he builds his factory and moves out of CA.

People can still buy his cars but at least we in the BA won't have to listen
to his temper tantrums.

He's taken the red pill anyway...

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CharmingFrock
I don't think Texas allows mathematical baby names either.

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explorigin
Likely, but not yet decided. The other front-runner is Tulsa.

~~~
pmorici
There was a reddit post two days ago from a user claiming he had found land
purchase records showing Tesla had purchased 1000 acres in Hutto Texas a
northern suburb of Austin. The parcel was adjacent to a rail depot that had
been recently developed.

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mensetmanusman
Every additional factory is good news.

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RickJWagner
Texas is trendier, but all of Oklahoma would instantly be rabid Tesla fans if
Musk chooses Tulsa.

I hope he does.

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api
I'm astounded that they ever tried to operate a factory in the Bay Area to
begin with. Forget about regulations and taxes. The real issue is cost of
living. You're going to have to pay all employees 2-3X what you'd have to pay
them elsewhere, and it's not like they're keeping any of that. It's all going
to rent/mortgage payments.

~~~
delfinom
Austin is comparatively better but not a whole lot. The big three cities in
Texas are getting extremely expensive with ridiculous traffic to boot.

~~~
skellington
Austin is still dirt cheap compared to the Bay Area if you're not living in
the core area. The housing around where the Gigafactory is going to be is very
affordable.

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Simulacra
Musk is a more vocal, libertarian version of Steve Jobs. He pushes forward
when others say no. Like him or not, you cannot deny his achievements.

------
JoeAltmaier
Shoulda started in Texas. Much more compatible culture for his kind of
operation.

