Elon Musk meets with California Gov. Newsom at Tesla’s engineering headquarters

Tesla CEO Elon Musk and his staff met with California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Wednesday to tour Tesla’s new engineering headquarters.

A source close to the governor told CNBC that the meeting at Tesla’s engineering office in Palo Alto, Calif., focused on the company’s efforts to create jobs and expand its operations in the state.

The expansion will focus on R&D and recruiting engineers skilled in artificial intelligence. Tesla will take over the lease of his office space previously occupied by Hewlett-Packard. The plan will help accelerate efforts to create autonomous driving and robotics technology.

“I think this is the original headquarters of HP and a poetic transition from Silicon Valley founders to Tesla. We are very excited to make this our global engineering headquarters,” Musk told CNBC. told to “And we are a California and Texas company.”

Tesla has launched the meeting after several previous attempts to set up talks between the state’s most famous politician and the most outspoken billionaire have failed.

Musk said the new facility is “essentially Tesla’s headquarters” and “kind of like a company with two headquarters.” Tesla’s headquarters are in Austin, Texas.

It Comes To Face Tesla Regulatory scrutiny in a state. The California Department of Motor Vehicles has formally accused Tesla of engaging in deceptive marketing and advertising efforts regarding its driver assistance program under the brand names Autopilot and Full Self Diving. State civil rights agencies have also sued Tesla, alleging years of racist harassment and discrimination against black workers at Tesla’s car assembly plants and other facilities in California. .

Meanwhile, according to Tesla’s latest annual financial report, SEC filingsdistrict attorneys in various California counties are “investigating Tesla’s waste segregation practices” for hazardous waste-related code violations.

Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

California and its strong climate commitments are integral to Tesla’s success. California leads the U.S. zero-emission vehicle market with nearly 1.4 million of his ZEVs sold and is home to 55 of his ZEV-related manufacturing companies.

But when it came to his business, Musk’s view of California was less than friendly.

Musk and state officials clashed when the pandemic hit in March 2020. Fremont Tesla factory reopens, California. At the time, Musk was urging employees to return to work as the novel coronavirus impacted businesses across the country. Musk characterized California’s health-related COVID-19 restrictions as follows: “fascist.”

In 2021, after repeated threats to leave the state, Musk Tesla Headquarters Moved to Austin, Texas. The company owns and operates his two factories in Fremont and Lathrop, California.

Musk spoke to CNBC about his current thoughts on California.

“I think California should be wary of taxes and over-regulation,” he said. “Objectively, Tesla has only increased its footprint in California, both in terms of manufacturing and engineering and people.

Since then, Musk has made his political stance clear, characterizing California as a one-party state plagued by over-regulation and high taxes. Despite these comments, Newsom has praised Musk in multiple interviews. CNBCcalling him “one of the greatest innovators of our time.”

Musk, meanwhile, stressed that Tesla remains the state’s primary employer and is expanding its business. For example, in Q4 2022, Tesla boasted About the new Megapack factory in Lathrop, California.

“I’m not anti-California,” he told CNBC. may do so, but we encourage legislators to consider their actions long-term.”

Tesla said it will have 47,000 employees in California in 2022, according to January 2023 data blog postAs of December 31, 2022, the company and its subsidiaries have 127,855 employees worldwide. The company says its wages bring in $16.6 billion to the state’s economic activity, and that “every day, her $44.4 million is injected into California’s economy.”

CNBC’s Lora Kolodny contributed to this report.