Tesla founder and CEO Elon Musk has announced plans to move the electric-car maker’s corporate HQ from California to Texas.
«I’m excited to announce that we’re moving our headquarters to Austin, Texas,» Musk said Thursday during a shareholders meeting. The carmaker is currently based in Palo Alto, California.
«Just to be clear, we will be continuing to expand our activities in California,» he said. «This isn’t a matter of Tesla leaving California.»
Musk said in December that he’d personally move to Texas and also tweeted in May 2020 that he’d be moving Tesla’s headquarters to Texas or Nevada «immediately.»
Musk began developing a Tesla gigafactory in Texas in the summer 2020, and the state is also one of the locations for operations by SpaceX, another of Musk’s companies. Musk has pressed engineers, technicians and builders interested in working for the spacerocket builder to relocate to Texas. «Please consider moving to Starbase or greater Brownsville/South Padre area in Texas and encourage friends to do so!» Musk tweeted in March.
The move comes on the heels of a series of clashes with Alameda County officials last year over the forced shutdown of Tesla’s factory in Fremont, California, over concerns for worker safety. Musk eventually ignored the order and reopened the factory after downplaying the severity of the pandemic, daring officials to arrest him. No arrests were made, but Musk did tweet that Tesla would be suing the county for «acting contrary to… our Constitutional freedoms and just plain common sense.»
Tesla isn’t the only tech powerhouse attracted to the Lone Star State. Business software and services company Oracle said in December it’s changing its corporate headquarters from the Silicon Valley area to Austin to provide its workers «with more flexibility about where and how they work.» Hewlett-Packard Enterprise, a descendant of the pioneering Silicon Valley company, said in 2020 that it’s moving its headquarters from San Jose, California, to Houston.
Tesla could immediately be reached for comment, as the company dissolved its public relations department last year.
