Tesla’s European gigafactory will be built in Berlin

It is great news for Berlin (and Brandenburg) as it will bring (big) money and attract talent. It might even attract people from Poland which is only an hour drive away and has a large pool of very talented and experienced engineers. So far besides maybe Siemens there wasn&#x27;t too much industry here, which is more present in the south of the country.<p>Being outside of the city center it won&#x27;t contribute too much to gentrification and probably it will help Brandenburg getting more people to live there, pay taxes, buy property, shop, etc.<p>So far reactions have been neutral to good, which by Berlin standards is an amazing result.<p>I kind of wonder if the decision of bringing the factory to Berlin wasn&#x27;t based on the amount of software engineering talent that is available, more than the more traditional engineers.<p>In any case, I&#x27;m happy about Tesla coming to Germany, interesting times!

Good strategy from Treelon overall. You&#x27;ll have Tesla producing cars and employing thousands of workers in the U.S, China &amp; Germany so that no one would stifle the company&#x27;s path towards autonomous EV&#x27;s.<p>This will produce pressure on Europe to ease for instance the AI regulations and basically removed Customs tax from many other countries because Tesla can send the cars from three different locations.<p>I just don&#x27;t understand why Tesla is slow in expanding to other countries. Here in Israel we don&#x27;t have Teslas and it&#x27;s an extremely innovative place with very good conditions for an EV as Israel stretches 424 km (263 mi) from north to south. like two or three charging locations and you&#x27;re done.

Watching a SV company suddenly have to deal with German workers&#x27; rights (think: unions, significant protection from being fired without cause, rights to paid holiday and enforced maternity leave, even workers&#x27; councils which have representation at a management level) is going to be hilarious.

Please drop your inevitable BER jokes below so we can recylce them properly later.

The Brexiteers scoffing at &quot;Project Fear&quot; and crowing about the uppity Europeans begging us for our (UK) car business have been strangely quiet on this one.

I&#x27;m curious about how the massive left&#x2F;anti-fa movement in Berlin will react to this one.<p>They kept out Google after massive protests. Not sure this is the same thing though.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.theguardian.com&#x2F;technology&#x2F;2018&#x2F;oct&#x2F;24&#x2F;google-abandons-berlin-base-after-two-years-of-resistance" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.theguardian.com&#x2F;technology&#x2F;2018&#x2F;oct&#x2F;24&#x2F;google-ab...</a><p>p.s. I&#x27;m based in Berlin. Have no horse in the race except that the Google office would have been right down the street of where I work.

They obviously needed to get one built in Europe sooner rather than later to boost marketshare there and stay ahead of demand without needing to ship from China or the US, but why Berlin? Does anyone know if they got subsidies out of it?

Thanks Brexit, otherwise it would have been in UK as per Elon: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.autoexpress.co.uk&#x2F;tesla&#x2F;108395&#x2F;tesla-gigafactory-europe-to-be-built-in-germany-not-uk-as-elon-musk-blames-brexit" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.autoexpress.co.uk&#x2F;tesla&#x2F;108395&#x2F;tesla-gigafactory...</a>

Seeing a lot of comments saying their choice is good because it won&#x27;t contribute to gentrification.<p>Doesn&#x27;t sound right to me. Why is <i>that</i> the first~third thing you&#x27;re mentioning? It&#x27;s almost like we scorn the concept of more people working in an area towards a positive goal (renewable transport). Yikes.

How in the world does Tesla execute so fast? The Tesla team seems relentless in its ambitions.

According to local news sources, the location of the factory will be at&#x2F;near Grünheide near Berlin, roughly here: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;goo.gl&#x2F;maps&#x2F;orssVTcRQ6hwBTR76" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;goo.gl&#x2F;maps&#x2F;orssVTcRQ6hwBTR76</a>

Why should a GIGA factory be located near the airport and in a city ? A factory meant to mass produce something should be somewhere the land is cheap should not it be ?

Previous discussion: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=21517549" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=21517549</a>

The number sold electric vehicles in germany is still exponential not saturated, the government recently announced to build additional charging stations across the country in the order of 10 thousands and to increase the (tax) incentives for hybrid and fully electric cars. It is a good time to build a factory for electric cars in germany. Berlin is a sweet spot when it comes to talent in high tech, suppliers and transport connection.

Last week, the government of New york wrote down the value of Gigafactory 2 in Buffalo, which has been mired in scandal:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.syracuse.com&#x2F;state&#x2F;2019&#x2F;08&#x2F;elon-musk-is-full-of-s-tesla-factory-in-buffalo-failing-to-live-up-to-promises-report-says.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.syracuse.com&#x2F;state&#x2F;2019&#x2F;08&#x2F;elon-musk-is-full-of-...</a><p>Yesterday USA Today published an article about the disaster the Nevada factory has been for the State, and HN didn&#x27;t care:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.usatoday.com&#x2F;in-depth&#x2F;news&#x2F;investigations&#x2F;2019&#x2F;11&#x2F;12&#x2F;tesla-gigafactory-brings-nevada-jobs-and-housing-woes-worker-injuries-strained-ems&#x2F;2452396001&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.usatoday.com&#x2F;in-depth&#x2F;news&#x2F;investigations&#x2F;2019&#x2F;1...</a><p>Today, Elon mentions a new factory one day will be built in Germany, and HN loves it. This company is bullet proof.

This is all good news. Just wondering about repairs globally as Tesla&#x27;s start aging and they need to be repaired, or for whatever the current % of their vehicles require service year over year. They must have that info given the amount of telematics they generate AND that they are sole source for maintenance and repair.

German newspapers report that the availability of power from renewable sources was a big plus for Elon Musk.

See also: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.autoexpress.co.uk&#x2F;tesla&#x2F;108395&#x2F;tesla-gigafactory-europe-to-be-built-in-germany-not-uk-as-elon-musk-blames-brexit" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.autoexpress.co.uk&#x2F;tesla&#x2F;108395&#x2F;tesla-gigafactory...</a>

Headline should be corrected: the site is near Berlin, but not in Berlin.<p>Reported site is Grünheide, some 40 km drive from Brandenburger Tor, and a bit shorter distance from the under-construction BER airport.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.berlin.de&#x2F;en&#x2F;news&#x2F;5972608-5559700-elon-musk-tesla-giga-factory-berlin.en.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.berlin.de&#x2F;en&#x2F;news&#x2F;5972608-5559700-elon-musk-tesl...</a><p>What makes me curious is that this village is actually within a nature protection area, Naturschutzgebiet Löcknitztal. I could imagine that building such a symbol of international market economy there might attract anti-capitalist demonstrators and involve protesting and riots. But perhaps I&#x27;m wrong.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.google.com&#x2F;maps&#x2F;place&#x2F;Gr%C3%BCnheide,+Saksa&#x2F;@52.4155479,13.8387236,12.25z&#x2F;data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x47a83072fa52a477:0x23e432b8d9ec6b!8m2!3d52.4240211!4d13.8204336" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.google.com&#x2F;maps&#x2F;place&#x2F;Gr%C3%BCnheide,+Saksa&#x2F;@52....</a><p>I also find it somewhat interesting that in the political composition of this village of 8000 residents, the Social Democrats and Linke (Left) have 3 seats, and two seats are held by CDU, AfD, and.... Freiwillige Feuerwehr.<p>Yes, the voluntary fire brigade is apparently popular enough to feature in local politics. I think this is a somewhat sympathetic phenomenon in German local politics.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;de.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Gr%C3%BCnheide_(Mark)" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;de.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Gr%C3%BCnheide_(Mark)</a>

Good stuff.<p>I see Tesla &amp; Berlin playing out well.<p>Bunch of tech nomads hide out in Berlin and I&#x27;m sure the city is keen to steal market share from more traditional German car powerhouse cities.

German labour laws are very well suited plus there labour pool of qualified people is also very large.

I wonder if the rent freeze in Berlin will have any effect on Tesla attracting top talent.

It’s less of a good idea than the people here seem to think (especially Germans). Germany, as a shareholder of VW and very dependent upon taxes paid by all German car manufacturers is the “enemy” and has a large arsenal of methods available to hurt Tesla on its turf.

That is really interesting. What expertise are you speaking from?

Awesome win for Berlin.

Could build it on the old airport.

Near Berlin means the state of Brandenburg, which is famous for failed mega projects:<p>- Airport BER (still not open)<p>- Cargolifter airship factory (now used as a waterpark)<p>- Lausitzring (was supposed to host the F1, now hugely unprofitable)<p>- Semiconductor factory in Frankfurt&#x2F;Oder (abandoned, only the building got finished)<p>I am not aware of one single project that materialized as planned. The odds are against Elon on this one...

For some reason the Age of Empires multiplayer taunt &#x27;Hey, I&#x27;m in your town&#x27; comes to mind.