Elon Musk To Open Tesla Research Plant In Greece
Elon Musk may be hell bent on colonizing Mars but that doesn't mean he has forgotten Earth. The billionaire entrepreneur has reveal Tesla's plans to build a research and development facility in Greece called Tesla Greece.
Over the last few weeks, several reports have surfaced from Greece suggesting that the Musk-led company is planning to establish a local presence in the Mediterranean country. This was later confirmed by a spokesperson from the company via a statement to Electrek.
"Tesla is building a small research and development office in Athens, which will be comprised of a highly-qualified engineering team," the spokesperson said. "This team will focus solely on limited research and development activities to accelerate electric motor technology development through close collaboration with our team in the US."
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The facility's main focus will be the development of new electric motor technologies. Coincidentally, three of Tesla's top motor engineers came from Greece. Principal Motor Designer Konstantinos Laskaris, Motor Design Engineer Konstantinos Bourchas, and Staff Motor Design Engineer Vasilis Papanikolaou, all came out of the National Technical University of Athens.
Vasilis Apostolopoulos, Head of the Hellenic Entrepreneurs' Association, said that Tesla's plans for the country have such "game changing potential" that he has pledged to hand over his industrial plant for free as a testing grounds for the company's new products.
Apostolopoulos also promised to offer full medical coverage for a year to all of Tesla Greece's staff members. The chief executive of the Athens Medical Group, he described the move as "a vote of confidence" to the debt-stricken country.
The Greek office is expected to attract at least 50 engineers to run a research and development center which will be located at the state-run Demokritos Center for Scientific Research. However, the starting team will be relatively small starting with just 10 members.
Outside the UK, Germany, and the Netherlands, Tesla has no industrial presence in other European countries. The opening of the Greek office will mark the first time the company has expanded outside of Western Europe.
