Elon Musk confirmed that he personally moved to Texas full time and revealed that the reason is to focus on Tesla Gigafactory Texas in Austin and SpaceX’s Starship development in south Texas.
As for the future of the electric automaker and rocket company in California, it is still unclear.
Back in May, when Tesla was fighting the local authorities in California in order to reopen its Fremont factory, Musk said that he would “immediately” be moving Tesla’s headquarters out of California:
Frankly, this is the final straw. Tesla will now move its HQ and future programs to Texas/Nevada immediately.
It ended up being an empty threat as the automaker was authorized to repopen its factory a week later, and Tesla’s headquarters remained in Palo Alto, California.
But over the last few weeks, Musk has been rumored to be personally moving to Texas after he obtained a Texas driver license and moved his foundation to the state.
In a new interview with WSJ, Musk confirmed that he has now moved to Texas:
Musk stated that the reason behind his move was the fact that his two biggest projects right now are Tesla’s Gigafactory Texas project and SpaceX’s development of the Starship rock and spaceship, which are all happening in the Lone Star state.
The CEO didn’t comment on potentially moving Tesla and/or SpaceX headquarters to Texas, but he did mention that Tesla is the last automaker producing cars in California, and SpaceX is the last aerospace company with major manufacturing operations in the state.
He did add that he believes California has become complacent in fostering innovation.
A few months ago, Musk said that it’s still a possibility that Tesla could move out of California in the future:
There’s no question that our headquarters will remain in California for the short term. Long term, we’ll have to wait and see.
The CEO said that it would depend on how Tesla is treated by the state of California.
Electrek’s Take
I get it. I love Texas. I love California, too.
Now I don’t know if I believe Elon’s explanation that it is just about Tesla Gigafactory and SpaceX’s Starship development.
I feel like no income taxes could be welcomed, especially with the timing of Elon stacking up stock option tranches like crazy lately thanks to Tesla’s stock hitting new highs every other day.
As for Tesla’s HQ staying in California, I think it’s the most likely outcome, but I know that Elon’s previous comments have been really worrying to employees at the headquarters.
I think his threats to move Tesla because of the pandemic shutdown was a bad move. I am glad that he has tempered his comments.
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