Briefcase
Tesla officially moves HQ from California to Texas
AUSTIN, Texas – Tesla says it has officially moved its corporate headquarters from Silicon Valley to a large factory under construction outside of Austin, Texas.
The company made the announcement late Wednesday in a filing with U.S. securities regulators. CEO Elon Musk had said at the company’s annual meeting in October that the move was coming.
The filing said the relocation from Palo Alto, California, to what Tesla calls a “Gigafactory” on Harold Green Road near Austin was done on Wednesday.
In U.S. regulatory filings at the end of last year, Tesla said it had about 71,000 employees worldwide. Company news releases in 2020 said about 10,000 work at the Palo Alto headquarters and 10,000 are employed at its factory in Fremont, California.
It wasn’t clear if all of the headquarters employees would be required to move. A message was left Wednesday seeking comment from Tesla, which has disbanded its media relations department.
GM venture to build battery chemical plant
DETROIT – General Motors is forming a joint venture with Posco Chemical of South Korea to build a North American battery materials plant as it brings more steps in the electric vehicle supply chain under its umbrella.
The Detroit automaker said Wednesday details of the venture are still being worked out, including investment amounts and the plant location. GM said the factory will supply materials to make cathodes, the energy center of a battery that amounts to 40% of the cost.
The plant will employ hundreds of people and will start making materials in 2024, said Doug Parks, GM’s global product development and supply chain head.
The plant will supply four North American battery cell factories that GM plans to build. Two of those locations have been announced, Spring Hill, Tennessee, and Lordstown, Ohio.
Tech company changes name from Square to Block
SAN FRANCISCO — There’s a new Silicon Valley corporate name change on the block.
A month after Facebook renamed itself Meta, Square Inc., the payments company headed by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, is changing its name to Block Inc.
The San Francisco-based company said Wednesday it’s making the change because the Square name has become synonymous with the company’s commerce and payments business. But it has grown since its start in 2009 and now owns the Tidal music streaming service, Cash App and TBD54566975, a financial services platform whose primary focus is Bitcoin.
The move comes just two days after Dorsey resigned as CEO of Twitter. He’s still CEO of the newly named Block.
Manufacturing activity grows in November
SILVER SPRING, Md. – U.S. manufacturing activity grew at a faster pace in November with producers trying to keep up with demand amid ongoing supply shortages and delays.
The Institute for Supply Management, a trade group of purchasing managers, said Wednesday its index of manufacturing activity rose to a reading of 61.1 in November, just above September’s 60.8.
Any reading above 50 indicates growth in the manufacturing sector. The manufacturing sector has recorded 18 straight months of growth going back to spring of 2020 when the pandemic broke.
From wire reports