2023-06-08 14:16:14
ValenciaThe desire to turn the Valencian Country into one of the main poles of the new automotive industry in Europe is gaining more and more weight. And it is that the future Volkswagen battery factory and the designation of the Ford plant in Almussafes as the one in charge of producing the new electric vehicles in the Old Continent, could be joined by the arrival of Tesla.
To make this option a reality, the American company would be negotiating with the Generalitat Valenciana the location in the Valencian Country of a large factory, the size of which, however, is unknown and in which town it would be installed, although localities like Xest or Llíria fight. In fact, the Valencian government does not even recognize that the company at the center of the talks is the one chaired by Elon Musk. He does admit that he is negotiating with a large multinational in the automotive sector and that the economic investment that the start-up would entail would exceed that of the Volkswagen gigafactory in Sagunto, which reaches 4.5 billion euros.
Despite the confidentiality of the meetings, the newspaper Levante and the Europa Press agency published this Thursday that the company that would lead this great operation would be Tesla. As for the negotiations, the same sources point out that, although they are not “one hundred percent” closed, they are “very advanced”. Faced with this information, the Generalitat has issued a statement in which it has guaranteed that it had not confirmed any element of the possible operation to any means of communication and has explained that this is because the negotiations it maintains “are subject to strict confidentiality criteria”.
Despite the secrecy of the Valencian government, expert sources in the sector have confirmed to ARA that the opening of a factory in the Valencian Country of Musk’s company “would make perfect sense” after the location of the future battery plant of Volkswagen in Sagunto. Along these lines, I would also point to the fact that Ford has already confirmed that it is very interested in being able to acquire part of the batteries manufactured in Sagunto to use in its vehicles.
These same sources have pointed out that the American company usually maintains very demanding negotiating positions and that the agreement, if it is finally closed, will not be easy for the Generalitat Valenciana. In order to try to seduce the company that also owns Twitter, the Council plans to process the initiative as a strategic territorial project, given that it is a formula that makes it possible to speed up its execution.
Even more decisive may be the volume of financial aid it receives from the second PERTE of the Electric and Connected Vehicle that the Spanish government is preparing with funding from the European Union’s Next Generation funds. An aid package that is expected to be more flexible, because in the first only 792 million euros were allocated, the equivalent of 30% of the almost 3,000 million that had been initially planned.
If confirmed, the arrival of Tesla would mean a new success for the Valencian automotive industry, given that the electric vehicle company led by Elon Musk sold more than 1.31 million vehicles worldwide in 2022 and the its model Tesla Model I was the best-selling car in Europe in February.
The Californian company currently has six large gigafactories around the world, with four centers in the United States, one in Shanghai and another in Berlin. The new headquarters in Valencia would therefore be the brand’s second large factory on the European continent, although it is true that they have more logistics and assembly centers in Germany and the Netherlands.
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