Tesla’s Austin Gigafactory will finally open to the public this spring, after months of mystery surrounding the 4 million-sqft building.
The electric car company’s CEO Elon Musk, who moved to Austin last year, tweeted over the weekend that Tesla would hold a grand opening for the factory on April 7. The company is notoriously secretive, but we were too curious to wait, and did some research on what this party might include. Here’s our hypothesis:
A recreation of the company’s Berlin “GigaFest”
Tesla hosted a “GigaFest” to celebrate the opening of its Berlin Gigafactory in October. The event had a limited capacity + required registration, but still drew thousands of attendees.
The day-long festival at the Berlin factory included:
- Live music and DJs
- Food trucks and drinks
- Carnival rides, including a ferris wheel
- Test rides in the Model Y vehicle
- A factory tour
- An in-person speech by Elon Musk
What do we know about the Austin event so far? Very little. The announcement itself took place in just five words. When asked by a local Twitter user when Austin’s GigaFest would take place, Musk replied, “April 1st” and later corrected with “Actually, April 7th.”
It looks like for now, that’s all we know — however, Musk has previously promised factory tours.
Tesla town
Tesla Giga Texas, a possibly $10 billion factory in East Austin has been producing Model Ys since December, around the time when the car company’s headquarters relocated to the 2,000-acre property.
In the coming years, the site could be getting even bigger. Musk has said he envisions 20,000 ATX employees working on Model Ys, Cybertrucks, Semis, and Model 3 sedans.
It looks like the CEO is settling into Central Texas for the long haul — his mining company the Boring Co. is now based in Pflugerville, and he has also teased opening a SpaceX facility in Austin.
