Elon Musk
Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, denied what was stated in the Wall Street Journal report, which indicated that there were talks with Saudi Arabia to establish an electric car factory.
The American billionaire said, in a post on the “X” website, “Twitter” previously: “Another completely false article from the Wall Street Journal,” and he attached a picture of the newspaper’s report with the tweet.
On Monday, the Wall Street Journal quoted informed sources as saying that Saudi Arabia is holding talks in the early stages with the American electric car manufacturer Tesla to establish a factory in the Kingdom.
The newspaper stated in its report that Saudi Arabia is trying to attract Tesla by granting it the right to purchase certain quantities of the minerals and metals it needs from countries including the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
The Wall Street Journal report stated that one of the proposals being considered by the Kingdom includes providing financing to the commodity trading giant Trafigura to implement a faltering cobalt and copper project in Congo that would help supply the potential Tesla factory with supplies.
A Trafigura spokesman said that the company is considering its options for the Motoshi project in Congo amid rising costs and continuing low cobalt prices, according to Reuters.
Musk said in May that Tesla may choose a location for a new factory by the end of 2023. The company currently has six factories and is building a seventh in Mexico with the aim of expanding its global presence. The company aims to sell 20 million cars annually by 2030, up from about 1.3 million in 2022.
The Kingdom is trying to diversify its economy so that it does not depend on oil alone, and the Saudi sovereign wealth fund is the largest investor in Lucid Group, one of the emerging electric car companies looking to challenge Tesla’s dominance of the sector.
This report comes hours after the Turkish Presidency’s Communications Department announced that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan asked Tesla CEO Elon Musk to build a factory for the company in Turkey.
Creating high-capacity batteries for electric cars
2023-09-19 08:28:16
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