Elon Musk unveils chip manufacturing plans for SpaceX and Tesla

Elon Musk recently outlined ambitious plans for a chip-building collaboration between his companies Tesla and SpaceX.

Bloomberg reports that Musk shared his plans on Saturday night at an event in downtown Austin, Texas, with a photo suggesting that what Musk is calling the “Terafab” facility will be built near Tesla’s Austin headquarters and “gigafactory.”

Musk said he’s pursuing this project because semiconductor manufacturers aren’t making chips quickly enough for his companies’ artificial intelligence and robotics needs: “We either build the Terafab or we don’t have the chips, and we need the chips, so we build the Terafab.”

The goal is to manufacture chips that can support 100 to 200 gigawatts of computing power per year on Earth, along with a terawatt in space, Musk said. He did not offer a timeline for these plans.

As Bloomberg noted, Musk does not have a background in semiconductor manufacturing, but he does have a history of overpromising on goals and timelines. 

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