Musk's Terafab chip-making facility begins construction in Texas

Published Aug 7, 11:00 AM UTC

SpaceX and Tesla have formally unveiled plans for the initial phase of their massive Terafab semiconductor manufacturing complex in Grimes County, Texas. The first stage, expected to use Intel's 14A process technology, requires a $16.8 billion investment. The completed campus will encompass over 100 million square feet of manufacturing space, making it far larger than any existing semiconductor facility, including Samsung's Pyeongtaek campus. Terafab is envisioned as a vertically integrated campus housing logic, memory, packaging, and testing operations to shorten production cycles. It will exclusively produce AI inference processors for Tesla Optimus robots and Cybercab vehicles, as well as high-power processors for SpaceX space-based data centers. The facility will employ at least 3,000 people, mostly local residents, and will use water from Gibbons Creek Reservoir with on-site wastewater treatment and recycling. The project follows Tesla's earlier groundbreaking on a research semiconductor facility at Giga Texas.