Electric sportscar maker Tesla Motors is reported to be in “late-stage” negotiations for an undisclosed site to build its planned new Model S sedan and an announcement is expected soon.
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A recent Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal report said the new location would replace one in San Jose, California, that the San Carlos electric car company had intended for its Model S manufacturing.
Tesla at one time also had its eye on New Mexico as a possible site for a manufacturing plant, the paper added, but the company shifted its focus from San Jose after it had trouble raising venture funding for the project. It has now shifted to trying to win a US$250m federal, low-interest loan for the factory through the US government’s Advanced Technology Vehicle Manufacturing Programme.
The report said the San Jose site wouldn’t work under the federal programme because it is an undeveloped ‘greenfield’ site and Tesla would have built on it from scratch. The programme favours ‘brownfields’ – ie sites on which factories or plants closed years ago and need to be rehabilitated. Numerous former automaking sites here in the UK have been turned into retail parks and commercial centres in recent years.
A spokeswoman told the Business Journal that Tesla has been approached by numerous commercial real estate developers with potential sites.
The company plans to unveil the new sedan in March at an event in Hawthorne where its design studio is located.
