Tesla is making serious moves to build out its internal semiconductor expertise, successfully poaching high-level talent from the top ranks of the chip industry. Intel veteran Gary Jiang's LinkedIn page now lists his designation as a Director at Tesla, marking the first big leadership hire tied directly to the ambitious TERAFAB chip project. Jiang spent more than 17 years at Intel, where his most recent role was Factory Manager, leading tooling and production ramps for cutting-edge semiconductor nodes.
According to a report from Electrek, Jiang started on-site in Austin this month. His deep background in technology transfer and factory startups is exactly the kind of specialized experience Tesla needs to bring its plans to fruition. While Tesla has excelled at designing custom silicon for years, physically manufacturing microchips at scale is an entirely different beast.
Landing Intel's Top Manufacturing Talent
Jiang's track record at Intel makes him a perfect fit for a project built from the ground up. At his previous employer, he was responsible for construction, equipment installation, and high-volume manufacturing preparation for advanced chip technologies. Before managing those next-generation lines, he ran area operations at Intel's massive Arizona campus, covering high-volume output for legacy 14nm and 22nm hardware.
Bringing in an executive who knows how to budget capital equipment and fix production yields shows Tesla is looking to skip the typical growing pains of chip fabrication. The move comes right as recruitment efforts pick up in Texas, with recent job postings seeking program managers capable of overseeing massive capital expenditure budgets for raw factory construction. Recent regulatory filings indicate the initial phases of the TERAFAB project have a total projected investment of $119 billion, and, per Elon Musk, that too is flexible.
The Massive Scale of the TERAFAB Project
Musk first broke down his vision for TERAFAB at a launch event back in March, positioning it as the most ambitious chip-building project in human history. The concept aims to bring together the combined technological forces of Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI (which SpaceX now owns) to consolidate chip design, advanced packaging, fabrication, and testing under one roof, allowing for unprecedented iteration and production cycles. We saw the foundation click into place when Tesla and SpaceX partnered with Intel in April, confirming the latter would supply the core manufacturing know-how.
The scope of this multi-company mega-project has grown at a staggering pace. To support this scale, SpaceX recently filed for a TERAFAB construction site in Texas, located in Grimes County. This new executive hire proves that the coalition is aggressively buying up the exact institutional knowledge required to turn those massive site plans into active, high-volume chip production lines.
