Musk's heavy announcement! Tesla, Inc. (TSLA.US) plans to invest 30 billion dollars to build a chip research and development factory, targeting the most advanced process of Intel Corporation (INTC.US)

Tesla, Inc. CEO Elon Musk revealed that the company plans to invest approximately $3 billion to build a research and development chip factory in Texas, taking a key step in the large-scale layout of the chip manufacturing field. Musk also stated that the Terafab project will adopt Intel Corporation's most advanced 14A process technology, which is expected to make Tesla, Inc. the first major customer of this cutting-edge technology. Musk's chip ambitions Musk revealed on Wednesday during the company's quarterly earnings conference call that the research center will be built within Tesla, Inc.'s existing Texas Gigafactory campus. The center will have a monthly production capacity of only a few thousand wafers, primarily serving as an experimental platform for new technologies and processes. SpaceX, under Musk's leadership, will be responsible for early-stage work on the broader Terafab project. Intel Corporation will provide professional technical expertise in chip design, manufacturing, and packaging as a partner. Musk stated, "Our current plan is for Tesla, Inc. to be responsible for the research and development wafer fab. SpaceX will be responsible for the initial work on the large-scale Terafab project, with further planning required for the subsequent stages." Terafab is Musk's ambitious plan to enter the advanced chip manufacturing field, with teams from Tesla, Inc., SpaceX, and his artificial intelligence company xAI all participating. The billionaire explained that the goal of the Terafab project is to ensure a sufficient supply of chips to meet the needs of his companies, as current chip foundries like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Ltd. Sponsored ADR and Samsung Electronics are unable to meet this demand. The proposed budget of $3 billion is roughly equivalent to one-tenth of the investment required for a leading company in the industry to build and equip an advanced wafer fab. Purchasing a machine from a supplier like ASML Holding NV ADR could cost hundreds of millions of dollars. In the history of the industry, some semiconductor manufacturers have set up so-called pilot production lines. These small-scale facilities are used to test new designs and processes to verify their readiness for large-scale production. The advantage of these lines is the ability to verify new technologies at a lower cost, but they do not have the capacity for mass production of chips economically. Musk stated, "Any cooperation between companies must be approved by the SpaceX and Tesla, Inc. boards of directors. This requires going through a conflict of interest review process." Adopting Intel Corporation's most advanced process During the earnings conference call, when asked for specifics about Intel Corporation's involvement, Musk stated that he plans to adopt Intel Corporation's most advanced 14A process technology, and Intel Corporation has not yet finalized any customers for this technology. This statement led to a 3% increase in Intel Corporation's stock price in after-hours trading on Wednesday. Musk did not explicitly state whether he plans to use Intel Corporation's existing factories or if he will obtain authorization for their production technology. Musk said, "We plan to adopt Intel Corporation's 14A process technology, which is currently the most advanced technology and not yet fully mature. But considering that the 14A process may be quite mature or ready for use when Terafab is ready for scaling production, this seems like the right choice."