The semiconductor manufacturing joint venture between SpaceX and Tesla called Terafab aims to reach volume production by the third quarter of 2028, said tech titan Elon Musk on a SpaceX conference call on Tuesday.
“I put big error bars on the timeline because we don’t know whether we will actually achieve this goal or not,” Musk said, referring to the timeline.
Musk, who owns both the ventures, termed the timeline “a rough and aggressive schedule” for a project that aims to produce one terawatt a year of computing power for AI and robotics.
Terafab is looking to defy the United States’ standard R&D timeline to deploy its cutting-edge logic factory.
In the world’s largest economy, raising such infrastructure takes three or more years on average.
Musk has described the planned complex in Texas as combining advanced manufacturing, packaging, and testing of both advanced logic and memory chips in one facility.
On Tuesday, Musk said that internally, Terafab aims to have a first test chip, using static random-access memory (SRAM) circuits, functional in roughly May or June of next year at the Austin research facility.
Chip manufacturers commonly fabricate SRAM circuits to improve the manufacturing process.
Musk, who has a history of setting timelines that his companies eventually end up missing, said, “Let’s just say that the outcome of achieving volume production is at least in the set of possible outcomes for Q3 or Q4 of 2028.”
“So these are obviously like insanely fast time frames for chip production,” he added further.
During the SpaceX conference call, a sell-side analyst reportedly asked Musk whether SpaceX had placed orders for the extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography machines produced only by the Dutch company ASML.
These machines have emerged as the backbone in the production of the most cutting-edge chips made by Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD).
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Answering that, Musk said, “Now these were very aggressive dates, and we’re very appreciative of ASML and all of our other suppliers in accelerating equipment deliveries to achieve this outcome.”
While Terafab eyes reaching volume production by the third quarter of 2028, one of the challenges the project is facing is acquiring enough of the complex, along with headwinds like securing expensive semiconductor manufacturing equipment from ASML or American suppliers such as Applied Materials and KLA.
Intel will be joining the Terafab project to help accelerate the R&D and production goals.
Earlier in October, Musk said there had been discussions about potential cooperation with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), the world’s largest advanced chip manufacturer.
However, he later backtracked by stating that Terafab was committed to running the facility itself.
Apart from Terafab, Musk is also facing investor questions on whether SpaceX will merge with Tesla, bringing together two of Elon Musk’s biggest companies in a union.
“When will SpaceX merge with Tesla?” was the second-most upvoted question—drawing 26 upvotes—submitted by investors to SpaceX management ahead of its third-quarter earnings webcast on Tuesday.
The same question received 128 upvotes on the Tesla investor relations site.
The query outvoted the one involving the progress of Starship’s lunar lander hardware.
The trend indicated that Starship is generating more excitement among retail investors, while analysts and institutional shareholders are seeking detailed information on AI revenue and spending.
While SpaceX has made progress testing Starship, it has yet to fully demonstrate key technologies needed to turn the giant rocket into a lunar lander, including orbital refueling.
While the company’s profitable satellite internet service, Starlink, is helping to fund significant expenditures on chips, terrestrial data centers, and Grok, the increasing losses in the AI sector will keep Musk vigilant.