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Tesla’s European gigafactory will be built in Berlin
- choeger 7y agoPlease drop your inevitable BER jokes below so we can recylce them properly later.
- PopeDotNinja 7y agoI loved flying in and out your new airport!
- wbillingsley 7y agoGet in quick, there's only 49 days left of BER months this year!
- notJim 7y agoPlacing it near that airport may be the biggest risk Musk has ever taken.
- freeflight 7y agoIt's not open yet, there's a chance it will never open. Might even be an investment opportunity: Swoop in and buy the whole mess once the German government decides it has thrown enough money into their bottomless pit.
- zaarn 7y agoThe government will likely never do that, it's a prestige project so it will completed unless the entire government collapses.
- freeflight 7y ago> unless the entire government collapses Well, at this point that seems more likely than that airport ever finishing.
- john_minsk 7y agoAnd transform it into rocket launchpad: - fast parts delivery from China on BFR - competition for EU launchers etc. {joke}
- raphman 7y agoThat's not entirely correct. Sure, the passenger terminals are a big mess and it is not yet clear when they will open. However, the cargo terminal has been in operation since 2013 [1]. [1] https://www.berlin-airport.de/en/business-partners/airlines-and-handling/air-cargo/short-profiles/ber/index.php https://www.berlin-airport.de/en/business-partners/airlines-...
- pbreit 7y agoWhy is that?
- dmix 7y agoFor anyone confused like me they mean the airport https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berlin_Brandenburg_Airport?wprov=sfti1 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berlin_Brandenburg_Airport?w...
- baud147258 7y agoI first though of BER encoding and I was like 'What jokes and what's the relationship with Tesla'
- NGC404 7y agoI bet elon will not be able to land in BER for the celebation of the millionth car rolled out there.
- jayalpha 7y agoYou will win this bet since zero cars are produced there.
- robertkrahn01 7y agoNah, BER will actually be turned into the Tesla factory. This way they can at least stop spending millions just to keep the lights on.
- notJim 7y agoIt's true, they both hemorrhage money, but at least with Tesla they also produce electric cars. (Tesla fans: relax.)
- pbreit 7y agoMight be getting downvoted since Tesla generated $2b in cash flow past 12m months and has all time high cash on hand. And then the "relax" insult despite being dead wrong.
- CathedralBorrow 7y agoI see Tesla fans emulate Elon's thin skin; how on earth is "relax" an insult?
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- jayalpha 7y agoBest place to store the Boeing 737 MAX airplanes.
- jcranmer 7y agoWait, so if I have this correct, the airport took ~6 years to construct and 9 years and counting to correct problems with its construction? Meaning that it would have been faster to tear the entire building down and rebuild it from scratch than it is taking to remedy the issues? How does that happen‽
- detaro 7y agoMassive failures in oversight and management. Airport building/management company that makes changes to the design pretty randomly, total failure in oversight mechanisms (basically, there was no review process in place which could have caught this while it was going on), as a result a building that doesn't match the original plans, doesn't conform to regulations and where in the end the actual state of what exists wasn't even known. Brought down by failing the fire safety certifications shortly before the opening, at which point the slow "figure out what happened and who to blame" process began, and then attempts to fix it. It's a glorious mess. Even if there had been a consensus on almost-rip-and-replace immediately, it's not clear that could have been done as quickly, given the amount of preparation needed. (As an example of the kind of changes, during the building process they decided to re-assign arrivals and departures to different floors of the building. Which in an airport has fairly fundamental consequences due to security zones etc...)
- freeflight 7y agoThat's what happens when political corruption becomes a culture, while nobody wants to seriously talk about it.
- _pmf_ 7y agoPoliticians take turns taking lucrative positions within the project companies, "to help".
- usrusr 7y agoAccording to lore, it all started with the architect deciding against the tried and tested usage of little chimney-like structure on top of the terminal roofs for fire protection de-fuming, insisting instead on some novel, less visible solutions for aesthetic reasons. Those then caused all kinds of follow-up issues, eventually leading into the construction equivalent of the perpetual bugfix cycle, where every fix brings two new problems. Compounded by a colorful parade of high level "fix it guys" taking over the reins and failing in short progression, adding to the chaos.
- odiroot 7y agoHey, there's always Stuttgart 21 and Elbphilharmonie!
- xky 7y agoThis provides a decent and entertaining overview of why the Berlin airport has still not been completed. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ll58ZrIupKA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ll58ZrIupKA
- ptaipale 7y agoDer Postillon: Musk: "We chose Berlin as the location because it has the only CO2-free airport in the world" https://www.der-postillon.com/2019/11/tesla-ber.html https://www.der-postillon.com/2019/11/tesla-ber.html
- xvx 7y agoWell, the Germans ARE world famous for their factories... Edit: I was definitely referencing the Shoah where Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered six million Jews with brutally inhumane and genocidal efficiency.
- pfundstein 7y agoEdit: Ahh my bad, I jumped to the conclusion of this being a concentration camp reference. It was a bit of a stretch admittedly.
- Major_Grooves 7y agotbh I would not have leapt to assume that was a Hitler reference. Germany is indeed famous for its factories.
- alexdumitru 7y agoHow is that a reference to Hitler?
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- scarejunba 7y agoThey're a manufacturing powerhouse. It's a joke referencing that Tesla is head to head with BMW/Volkswagen et. al. and is setting up in their backyard.
- TomMarius 7y agoDue to my recent visit to the awesome Mercedes museum, I thought of it as car reference... Especially considering that we're speaking about cars...
- erk__ 7y agoAutostadt in Wolfsburg is also worth a visit though I am not sure if you can book a visit to the factory anymore.
- jaimex2 7y agoFor some reason the Age of Empires multiplayer taunt 'Hey, I'm in your town' comes to mind.
- mdorazio 7y agoThey 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?
- webkike 7y agoI think it makes sense. Berlin is very spacious and connected to a lot of cities via rail.
- wirrbel 7y agoBerlin is about 230 km (140 miles) away from Wolfsburg, where Volkswagen is located. Pretty sure there is infrastructure and are suppliers nearby.
- radicalbyte 7y agoTalent. It's why you see clustering of industries.
- ChuckNorris89 7y agoExcept that most automotive talent is clustered in the south of Germany (greater Stuttgart and greater Munich), not in Berlin. If you do a quick job search, those places have the most jobs in Auto and also the highest wages.
- gerbal 7y agoBerlin has a very large tech industry, a lower cost of living, and lower wages.
- ChuckNorris89 7y agoDepends how you want to use the word tech. For the US it usually means some successful SV FAANG type software company. For Germany it's usually some successful hardware engineering company (Siemens, Bosch, Mercedes, Arri, Infineon, Continental etc.). Those companies can afford to pay the equivalent of FAANG wages in Germany albeit at a smaller scale. Southern Germany has more experience and talent in the latter while Berlin has more software startups and web devs, similar to the former.
- Koremat6666 7y agoWhy 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 ?
- TomMarius 7y agoWhy not both when you can have it? Clearly there is some just right place in Berlin
- danhak 7y agoThe area immediately around major airports is usually not terribly desirable. I don’t know about Berlin, specifically. Also it has to be close enough to the city to make commuting from the population center reasonable, no?
- pantalaimon 7y agoThe new train line to the airport is scheduled to open in 2025, then it should only take 20 minutes there from the city centre.
- _ph_ 7y agoBerlin is in a special situation due to the history. As only west Berlin belonged to west Germany and east Berlin and all the surrounding areas were part of the DDR, there is still a steep fall-off in industrialization as soon as you leave the direct Berlin area. Also in the DDR the industrial centers were in other cities than Berlin. So there should be plenty of cheap real estate not too far from Berlin. Also in Bavaria, once you leave Munich (BMW), Augsburg or Ingoldstadt (Audi), there is quite a steep drop-off in density. The traditional high-density industrial regions of Germany are rather in the west and south-west.
- hinkley 7y agosupply chain, labor? I mean we used to build factories on the river for that reason. Made a royal mess, but easy to ship things in and out.
- AngryData 7y ago
- radicalbyte 7y agoGerman labour laws are very well suited plus there labour pool of qualified people is also very large.
- arez 7y agowhy are german labour laws very well suited? Tesla had several incidents with injured workers and safety violations
- xedeon 7y ago> Tesla had several incidents with injured workers and safety violations More than the industry average in the state of California? If so, care to site your source?
- swish_bob 7y agoNumerous, repeated stories over the years. They keep claiming they've improved, and it's possible they have, but stories keep surfacing. https://riskandinsurance.com/5-takeaways-from-teslas-safety-and-workers-comp-tribulations/ https://riskandinsurance.com/5-takeaways-from-teslas-safety-...
- xedeon 7y agoAgain, how do the numbers of substantiated report stack up compared to other manufacturers? That would be the only metric that matters. The article you linked looked like an opinion piece and provided zero data points or official documents. Lastly, Cal-OSHA has much stricter rules than other states. Tesla is pretty much the only auto manufacturer in the state of California currently. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Motor_vehicle_assembly_plants_in_California https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Motor_vehicle_assembl...
- lone_haxx0r 7y agoI would have guessed the opposite. Germany is known for having all sorts of restrictions
- propercoil 7y agoGood strategy from Treelon overall. You'll have Tesla producing cars and employing thousands of workers in the U.S, China & Germany so that no one would stifle the company's path towards autonomous EV's. 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. I just don't understand why Tesla is slow in expanding to other countries. Here in Israel we don't have Teslas and it'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're done.
- xxpor 7y agoIsn't the issue in Israel that you must have a local importer and dealer?
- propercoil 7y agoNo, but worst case you simply register a local company that will act as an importer (like anywhere else). This company will declare profits of 0 every year as all revenues will be shipped to Tesla U.S. The issue is with Tesla, they still didn't make the move on us I guess. At least I have my Tesla shares though.
- coldfire 7y agoROI may be? the market size in Israel is not as big in other countries, so it makes sense to target bigger audience first. Also does Israel have any good local EV manufacturers that can give Tesla any competition?
- propercoil 7y agoNo competition for Tesla at all, only e-tron is selling here a bit and I think the model 3 and Y will crush it here. In terms of market size, well they have them in Jordan next to us which have the same population size and they don't have half the country working in the tech space as our GDP per capita is way higher.
- doener 7y agoPrevious discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21517549 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21517549
- zwieback 7y agoYou were cheated, Mr Kebab, upvoted yours.
- NGC404 7y agoThe 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.
- tannhaeuser 7y agoExcept Germany has the highest energy prices in Europe, and as long as that doesn't change drastically, e-mobility is for a minority of enthusiasts and people who can afford to be bad at math. Just look at actual numbers of vehicles sold where Diesel still rules. Well, government could raise taxes on mineral oil (already at 63% [1]), but the German state is already drowning in cash and could issue bonds with negative yield. Charging stations are also an area where it goes completely wrong since these are owned and operated by municipalities and monopolist energy providers. Housing also goes wrong especially in Berlin where socialist government doesn't seem able to attract investors and plays ideological games for winning a left-wing electorate instead despite massive influx of 40000 people per year, in addition to energy-efficiency laws and lack of capacity making construction unprofitable (btw. solar industry also goes south). [1]: https://www.bundesfinanzministerium.de/Content/DE/Standardartikel/Service/Einfach_erklaert/2018-01-11-grundlagen-benzinpreis.html https://www.bundesfinanzministerium.de/Content/DE/Standardar...
- Kutta 7y agoWithin EU, immediate local demand is barely relevant compared to labor and manufacturing conditions, for setting up a factory. A Tesla factory in Germany will obviously supply at least the whole EU.
- tnolet 7y agoI'm curious about how the massive left/anti-fa movement in Berlin will react to this one. They kept out Google after massive protests. Not sure this is the same thing though. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/oct/24/google-abandons-berlin-base-after-two-years-of-resistance https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/oct/24/google-ab... p.s. I'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.
- pjc50 7y agoTesla isn't particularly political and there's no Fascist angle?
- DanielleMolloy 7y agoCan you elaborate on how you think Google is „fascist“?
- erikpukinskis 7y agoI think the idea is Google is a good tool for a hypothetical future fascist state to use. But I think their main concern was gentrification not fascism.
- jussij 7y agoEurope has lived history of governments collecting data on it's citizens. Since Google openly collects data on it's users, I suspect that fact does not sit well with that same populous.
- pteredactyl 7y agoFalse comparison. Google users are voluntary. No one forces someone to use Google like the Government forces someone to pay tax.
- InternetOfStuff 7y ago
- k__ 7y agoCould build it on the old airport.
- sneak 7y agohttps://brandenburg-braucht-tegel.de/ https://brandenburg-braucht-tegel.de/ There are a lot of Berliners who love Tegel and don't want it to close even when BBI is eventually open (whenever that may be). TXL is truly a fantastic airport, and would become even better when not overcrowded.
- k__ 7y agoI meant Tempelhof :D
- detaro 7y agoYou really think turning a popular public park (or if you mean the buildings, a publicly owned/used building with preservation status) in a central-ish location in the city, with worse freight transport connections than the airport, into a factory is a sensible or politically viable solution?
- sneak 7y agoI would have gone with “It’s already in use.”
- k__ 7y agoI had the impression it was a privatly owned property the owner wanted to use in a more profitable way.
- detaro 7y agoIt's owned by the city and last time there were plans about developing it permanently a public vote enacted a law preventing it from being built on.
- Havoc 7y agoGood stuff. I see Tesla & Berlin playing out well. Bunch of tech nomads hide out in Berlin and I'm sure the city is keen to steal market share from more traditional German car powerhouse cities.
- IOT_Apprentice 7y agoThis is all good news. Just wondering about repairs globally as Tesla'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.
- natch 7y agoWith no carburetors, alternators, starter motors, fuel pumps, fuel filters, oil filters, oil leaks, gas leaks, exhaust buildup, spark plugs, timing belts, radiators, head gaskets, mufflers, rings, manifolds, belts... and with brake pads that last forever... it's significantly less maintenance. And Teslas are not designed to milk the consumer for repairs over the years; they are designed to convince consumers that electric cars are a better choice. The Model 3 is designed to last 1 million miles. So sure, it will be fascinating to see how they do... but that's like 25 or more years from now.
- kwhitefoot 7y ago> and with brake pads that last forever. Not true if you live in an area where the roads are salted in the winter. Then they don't last any longer than on an ICE car unless you reduce or turn off regenerative braking. I had to have two replaced at the last service because of rust for just that reason and the car is only four years old (Model S). Tesla's advice was to reduce regen in the winter so that the brakes get used a bit more. A colleague also suggests doing an emergency stop once a year in the summer on a dry road to scour the brakes, not tried it, no idea if it would really be effective.
- natch 7y agoYes exception for very cold weather when regen is limited. Not so much to do with road salting, just use of brake pads versus non use, although salt could help cause rust to disks, not pads, which could in turn affect pads. But yes certain conditions may vary. > Then they don't last any longer than on an ICE car unless you reduce or turn off regenerative braking. This makes no sense. Reducing or turning off regen would make brake pad wear worse, not better. As an owner I assume you know your stuff so typo maybe?
- Zooper 7y agoNice! I hear a bunch of Lithium was just democratized for the freedom market.
- woodandsteel 7y agoI don't even understand what you are saying.
- atq2119 7y agoI assume it was some snark related to what's happening in Bolivia. I haven't followed that development closely enough myself to comment more than that.
- jansan 7y agoI did not follow the news, either, but it just occured to me that what's happening in Bolivia could have major implications for the German car industry.
- jansan 7y agoVolkswagen had made a deal with Bolivia to secure Lithium supply for their electric cars. This projects is now in Jeopardy. https://www.dw.com/en/bolivia-scraps-joint-lithium-project-with-german-company/a-51100873 https://www.dw.com/en/bolivia-scraps-joint-lithium-project-w...
- DoctorNick 7y agoExcellent timing, an untapped source of lithium just became open to exploitation.
- sidcool 7y agoHow in the world does Tesla execute so fast? The Tesla team seems relentless in its ambitions.
- grecy 7y agoCheckout this internal memo from Elon just as the Model 3 was going into ramp-up for production: – Excessive meetings are the blight of big companies and almost always get worse over time. Please get of all large meetings, unless you’re certain they are providing value to the whole audience, in which case keep them very short. – Also get rid of frequent meetings, unless you are dealing with an extremely urgent matter. Meeting frequency should drop rapidly once the urgent matter is resolved. – Walk out of a meeting or drop off a call as soon as it is obvious you aren’t adding value. It is not rude to leave, it is rude to make someone stay and waste their time. – Don’t use acronyms or nonsense words for objects, software or processes at Tesla. In general, anything that requires an explanation inhibits communication. We don’t want people to have to memorize a glossary just to function at Tesla. – Communication should travel via the shortest path necessary to get the job done, not through the “chain of command”. Any manager who attempts to enforce chain of command communication will soon find themselves working elsewhere. – A major source of issues is poor communication between depts. The way to solve this is allow free flow of information between all levels. If, in order to get something done between depts, an individual contributor has to talk to their manager, who talks to a director, who talks to a VP, who talks to another VP, who talks to a director, who talks to a manager, who talks to someone doing the actual work, then super dumb things will happen. It must be ok for people to talk directly and just make the right thing happen. – In general, always pick common sense as your guide. If following a “company rule” is obviously ridiculous in a particular situation, such that it would make for a great Dilbert cartoon, then the rule should change. If there is something you think should be done to make Tesla execute better or allow you to look forward to coming to work more (same thing in the long term), please send a note to [redacted] [1] https://medium.com/@StartupJourney/elon-musks-6-productivity-rules-from-a-letter-he-sent-to-tesla-employees-b10e3b899da0 https://medium.com/@StartupJourney/elon-musks-6-productivity...
- drchewbacca 7y ago
- gigatexal 7y agoAwesome win for Berlin.
- cwperkins 7y agoI wonder if the rent freeze in Berlin will have any effect on Tesla attracting top talent.
- iagooar 7y agoIt 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't too much industry here, which is more present in the south of the country. Being outside of the city center it won't contribute too much to gentrification and probably it will help Brandenburg getting more people to live there, pay taxes, buy property, shop, etc. So far reactions have been neutral to good, which by Berlin standards is an amazing result. I kind of wonder if the decision of bringing the factory to Berlin wasn't based on the amount of software engineering talent that is available, more than the more traditional engineers. In any case, I'm happy about Tesla coming to Germany, interesting times!
- mrmonkeyman 7y ago> It might even attract people from Poland I bet the Berlin people are thrilled.
- jillesvangurp 7y agoI think it makes sense from that angle but also from the angle that Germany is rich grounds for poaching people that are currently working for one of the other big car manufacturers. E.g. VW just opened a huge plant for producing their EVs in Zwickau which would about 300km away. Brandenburg as a state is an interesting. Crucially, it's not the state of Berlin (Berlin is s city state within the German federation). That means access to lots of grants/subsidies and also that they are somewhat shielded from the chaotic governance in Berlin.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- reallydontask 7y ago> (Berlin is s city state within the German federation). Is that a more literal translation of Bundesrepublik Deutschland? In English, Germany is normally referred to as Federal Republic of Germany?
- jansan 7y agoNear Berlin means the state of Brandenburg, which is famous for failed mega projects: - Airport BER (still not open) - Cargolifter airship factory (now used as a waterpark) - Lausitzring (was supposed to host the F1, now hugely unprofitable) - Semiconductor factory in Frankfurt/Oder (abandoned, only the building got finished) I am not aware of one single project that materialized as planned. The odds are against Elon on this one...
- Kutta 7y agoYou can always put a project into a reference class consisting only of failed projects. You can also put this project into the class of Tesla factories, none of which failed so far.
- jansan 7y agoAccording to local news sources, the location of the factory will be at/near Grünheide near Berlin, roughly here: https://goo.gl/maps/orssVTcRQ6hwBTR76 https://goo.gl/maps/orssVTcRQ6hwBTR76
- mellosouls 7y agoThe Brexiteers scoffing at "Project Fear" and crowing about the uppity Europeans begging us for our (UK) car business have been strangely quiet on this one.
- DonaldFisk 7y agohttps://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/nov/13/tesla-cites-brexit-as-germany-chosen-over-uk-for-european-plant-elon-musk https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/nov/13/tesla-cit...
- agent008t 7y agoTo be fair: 1. Brexit hasn't happened yet. I.e. UK has not been able to introduce policies that would make it a lot more competitive and friendly for business than the EU/Germany, make it friendlier for international talent, which is one of the opportunities created by Brexit. 2. We do not know what would have happened had Parliament and civil service been more positive and cooperative on Brexit. It could be a self-fulfilling prophecy - remainers in Parliament inadvertently creating greater uncertainty, which in turn drives business away as the leavers are unable to realistically guarantee a more competitive / friendlier for business Britain in the future.
- eloisant 7y agoThe shitshow in the UK parliament wasn't because of remainers, but mostly brexiters not agreeing on what kind of brexit they want.
- agent008t 7y agoCould the downvoters please explain the downvoting? Are you arguing that there is no scenario under which Brexit could make Britain a more attractive place for business than the EU or Germany?
- JamesLefrere 7y agoI’m not OP, but I would argue that. There’s no realistic scenario in which leaving the single market makes Britain a more attractive place for (most) businesses.
- navigatesol 7y agoLast week, the government of New york wrote down the value of Gigafactory 2 in Buffalo, which has been mired in scandal: https://www.syracuse.com/state/2019/08/elon-musk-is-full-of-s-tesla-factory-in-buffalo-failing-to-live-up-to-promises-report-says.html https://www.syracuse.com/state/2019/08/elon-musk-is-full-of-... Yesterday USA Today published an article about the disaster the Nevada factory has been for the State, and HN didn't care: https://www.usatoday.com/in-depth/news/investigations/2019/11/12/tesla-gigafactory-brings-nevada-jobs-and-housing-woes-worker-injuries-strained-ems/2452396001/ https://www.usatoday.com/in-depth/news/investigations/2019/1... Today, Elon mentions a new factory one day will be built in Germany, and HN loves it. This company is bullet proof.
- abstractbarista 7y agoSeeing a lot of comments saying their choice is good because it won't contribute to gentrification. Doesn't sound right to me. Why is that the first~third thing you're mentioning? It's almost like we scorn the concept of more people working in an area towards a positive goal (renewable transport). Yikes.
- Nasrudith 7y agoI think it highlights an issue with housing in general - if you judge by actions instead of words the logical but uncomfortable conclusion is that /everyone/, poor, middle class, or rich is horribly selfish and unwilling to agree to any cost which doesn't benefit them directly. From rent control to property values everyone has a "screw everyone else I have mine" attitude. I actually start to feel sorry for politicians for a change when they have people who want mathematical impossibilities.
- sl3e6 7y agoThat is really interesting. What expertise are you speaking from?
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- pjc50 7y agoSee also: https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/tesla/108395/tesla-gigafactory-europe-to-be-built-in-germany-not-uk-as-elon-musk-blames-brexit https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/tesla/108395/tesla-gigafactory...
- vertex-four 7y agoWatching a SV company suddenly have to deal with German workers' rights (think: unions, significant protection from being fired without cause, rights to paid holiday and enforced maternity leave, even workers' councils which have representation at a management level) is going to be hilarious.
- short_sells_poo 7y agoI'm all for some cultural drama, but I'd wager that they have done basic due diligence and they are aware of these factors :)
- C1sc0cat 7y agoNot always :-) An American Manger in BT NI manged to cause some major problems by not being sensitive to the special employment laws in Northern Ireland. Also IMARSAT had a spectacular car crash of a court case in the UK when some one blindly imported US style HR
- pgeorgi 7y agoI would have thought the same about Walmart, and yet: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2006/jul/28/retail.money https://www.theguardian.com/business/2006/jul/28/retail.mone...
- Krasnol 7y agoMaybe this is part of the reason why he does it. "Look he made it work in Germany with their "strict" workers rights. It can't be so bad" Also going to Germany, right in the face of the traditional car industry is a great show off too.
- Krasnol 7y agoOh well...maybe there were other reasons: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/nov/13/tesla-cites-brexit-as-germany-chosen-over-uk-for-european-plant-elon-musk https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/nov/13/tesla-cit...
- 7y ago
- ptaipale 7y agoHeadline should be corrected: the site is near Berlin, but not in Berlin. Reported site is Grünheide, some 40 km drive from Brandenburger Tor, and a bit shorter distance from the under-construction BER airport. https://www.berlin.de/en/news/5972608-5559700-elon-musk-tesla-giga-factory-berlin.en.html https://www.berlin.de/en/news/5972608-5559700-elon-musk-tesl... 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'm wrong. https://www.google.com/maps/place/Gr%C3%BCnheide,+Saksa/@52.4155479,13.8387236,12.25z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x47a83072fa52a477:0x23e432b8d9ec6b!8m2!3d52.4240211!4d13.8204336 https://www.google.com/maps/place/Gr%C3%BCnheide,+Saksa/@52.... 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. 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. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gr%C3%BCnheide_(Mark) https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gr%C3%BCnheide_(Mark)
- oska 7y agoLooking at that map I'd assume they're planning on building the factory in the cleared area at the top, just off the Lichtenower Weg, with good close access to Highway 1.
- ptaipale 7y agoYes, that makes sense. It's a bit of a shame that there's no Google Street View in much of Germany.
- oska 7y agoIt seems my guess was wrong. This map [1] shows where the factory will be cited (apparently based on some German media reports). [1] https://i.redd.it/eze28dydmiy31.png https://i.redd.it/eze28dydmiy31.png
- lazyjones 7y agoIt’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.
- plumednom 7y agoThere are so many poor nations in Europe where the people are suffering, of course, why not manufacture in the richest where the costs are highest with the lowest unemployment to ensure you have to pay higher salaries. Makes sense to me, if you're a nazi sympathizer.
- Tomte 7y agoGerman newspapers report that the availability of power from renewable sources was a big plus for Elon Musk.
- tigershark 7y agoThanks Brexit, otherwise it would have been in UK as per Elon: https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/tesla/108395/tesla-gigafactory-europe-to-be-built-in-germany-not-uk-as-elon-musk-blames-brexit https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/tesla/108395/tesla-gigafactory...