Tesla officially moves HQ to Austin factory
Electric automaker Tesla has now officially moved its headquarters from Palo Alto, Calif., to Austin.
On Oct 7, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced the company would be moving its headquarters to Austin, but gave few details on the timing of the move.
Now, documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday show the company has formally relocated its corporate headquarters to the same site as the $1.1 billion manufacturing facility it is currently building in southeastern Travis County.
Tesla has given few details about its move and its new Austin headquarters since the announcement. Tuesday’s filing notes that the company’s new headquarters address is now 13101 Harold Green Road in Austin, but does little to clear up most of the other unknowns — such as whether the company will build a separate headquarters building, how many employees might be coming to Central Texas or how many jobs might be created by the move.
Musk announced the headquarters move almost casually at the company’s annual shareholders meeting in October, surprising many local and state officials.
At the time, Musk said there was a limit to how big the company was able to scale in the San Francisco Bay Area, and also cited the higher cost of housing there and long commutes for employees. Musk first threatened to move the company’s headquarters to Texas or Nevada in 2020 following disagreements with California lawmakers.
The new securities filing confirms previous hints from Musk on the day of the announcement that seemed to imply the headquarters could be at the 2,100-acre property at Texas 130 and Harold Green Road where the company is building of its newest manufacturing facility. At the time, he said that the company would “create an ecological paradise here around the Colorado River.”
In July 2020, Musk announced Tesla would be building a $1.1 billion manufacturing facility in Central Texas. The company is expected to produce its Cybertruck, Semi, Model 3 compact sedan, model Y and batteries on the site, and could eventually hire up to 10,000 workers.
The facility has been progressing quickly, and major construction is expected to be completed in the next few months. Company executives have said production at Tesla’s Austin facility is still expected to start by the end of the year. Delivery of any of those vehicles is likely to start next year.
Texas and Austin are increasingly becoming a center of activity for Musk. The billionaire announced in 2020 that he had moved his residence to Texas to be closer to the Texas gigafactory site and Spacex’s facility in South Texas. The billionaire has also quietly expanded his other ventures into the Central Texas region. This includes his tunneling and infrastructure company, the Boring Co., which has facilities in Pflugerville and Bastrop; a potential Austin Spacex office, a potential Neuralink office; and the headquarters of his private foundation, the Musk Foundation.