Elon Musk was cheered as he directed the handover of Tesla’s first German-made vehicles at its Gruenheide plant on March 22, denoting the beginning of the U.S. automaker’s debut European center point only two years after it was first declared.
Boisterous music played as 30 clients and their families got an initial look at their sparkling new cars through a spectacular, neon-lit Tesla marked passage, applauding and cheering as Tesla Chief Executive Musk danced and joked with fans.
“This is a great day for the factory,” Musk said, mentioning it as “another step in the direction of a sustainable future”.
Musk said that Tesla is likely to launch a test version of its new “Full Self-Driving” software in Europe, possibly next year depending on regulatory approval.
“It’s quite difficult to do full self-driving in Europe,” Musk told factory workers on Tuesday, saying a lot of work should be done to deal with interesting driving circumstances in Europe where streets differ a lot by country. Although German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who likewise went to the event, commended the gigafactory as the fate of the vehicle industry, it has confronted resistance and a few ecological activists blocked the plant’s entry while showing banners flagging its high water use.
