Posted on 05/30/23
| News Source: News18
Elon Musk said Tuesday he was willing to expand his business in China, as he met Foreign Minister Qin Gang in Beijing on his first trip to the country in over three years.
China is the world’s biggest electric vehicle market and Musk’s company Tesla announced in April it would build a second massive factory in Shanghai.
Musk said he was “willing to continue to expand its business in China", according to a foreign ministry readout in which he also reportedly stressed Tesla’s opposition to economic “decoupling" with the United States.
Qin told Musk that China was “committed to creating a better market-oriented, rule-of-law-based and internationalised business environment" for foreign enterprises, the ministry said on its website.
The two countries, Qin said, should “apply the brakes in a timely manner to avoid dangerous driving".
Musk’s extensive business ties to China have raised eyebrows in Washington, with US President Joe Biden saying in November that the executive’s links to foreign countries were “worthy" of scrutiny.
The battery factory announced in April will be Tesla’s second plant in Shanghai after Gigafactory, which broke ground in 2019.
The new plant, which will have an initial capacity of 10,000 Megapack battery units per year, is expected to “start production in the second quarter of 2024", according to state news agency Xinhua.