Tesla Gigafactory Mexico might be coming online quite a bit later than expected, according to supplier sources.
After months of rumors, Tesla finally announced Gigafactory Mexico during its Investor Day in March.
The automaker secured a piece of land just outside of Monterrey, Nuevo León, to build the plant.
Tesla has talked about building the factory in record time with even hope to beat Gigafactory Shanghai’s timeline of nine months between breaking ground and production.
However, that groundbreaking has yet to come.
It has raised some red flags because Tesla would need to start work soon if it plans to start production as expected in 2025.
There was some work to prepare the grounds last month, but Tesla has yet to officially start construction as it still needs to secure all the permits despite the governor of Nuevo León, Samuel Alejandro García Sepúlveda, saying that the permit would be coming soon back in June.
Now a new report coming from Mexico’s Reforma suggests that Tesla might not be able to start production at Gigafactory Mexico until 2026 or even 2027.
They are basing this on supplier sources.
One Chinese supplier source said that they were recently told to wait on their plan to set up supporting production in Mexico:
“Two or three months ago there was a lot of rush, lots of pressure to look for a location. But one month later, they told us to wait.”
Tesla’s factories are so large that it is worth it for some of the biggest tier-one suppliers to set up shop next to them with their own production.
Top comment by Brett Chandler
I guess the real question here is what's changed since the initial announcement? Certainly, Tesla has dropped prices considerably and cut margins, so they feel business conditions have shifted significantly. This suggests to me that they probably don't even want to do this project now.
The Mexican publication also consulted with Danish engineering consultancy firm Ramboll to estimate the timeline to production based on the local permitting process, and the firm estimated that production would start in 2027.
Electrek’s Take
I would take this report with a grain of salt, as the sourcing is limited, but I wouldn’t surprised if it proves to be true.
What Tesla achieved in Shanghai was nothing short of spectacular, but there’s no guarantee that the success and quick timeline can be replicated in Mexico.
I can’t wait for Tesla to bring online Giga Mexico, but I think it is better to manage expectations.
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