“Elon Musk, the owner of Tesla, convinced President Andrés Manuel López Obrador to authorize a factory in Nuevo León with a series of proposals on the use of water for automotive production in the state”, said Martha Delgado, Undersecretary for Multilateral Affairs and Human Rights of the Ministry of Foreign Relations (SRE).
“The South African tycoon brought several solutions to the table that were very convenient, and President López Obrador found them extremely attractive. They had already planned the use of treated water for the cooling of their towers; the irrigation of green areas; and for the painting process, Musk mentioned the use of a reverse osmosis system in water treatment for vehicle paint”, Martha Delgado said in an interview for El Financiero.
She highlighted that the negotiation process lasted more than 14 months when the businessman who also owns Twitter and Starlink showed his interest in exploring the supply chain in Mexico.
The official stressed that Musk did not ask for any incentive to ‘tie’ the investment. However, she stressed that counterweights must be sought to make investment attractive, both from Tesla and from any other company that decides to come to our country.
“The negotiation experience with Tesla in the last year gave us ‘a lot of light’: this is a company that asked for almost zero incentives to install the auto plant. However, to install the electric battery plant that we want to build in the central zone of Mexico, we need to be clear about what incentives will be requested,” she said.
The Undersecretary for Multilateral Affairs and Human Rights of the Ministry of Foreign Relations added that, unlike Joe Biden in the United States, López Obrador clarified that he will not give subsidies, but counterweights such as tariffs on raw materials in China that are not available in Mexico, and are required to be attractive.
Tesla is the second automotive company in the year that confirms investment in Mexico, which could reach up to 5 billion dollars, according to Delgado. At the beginning of February, the BMW Group announced an investment of 800 million euros to expand its plant in San Luis Potosí to produce electric cars.
Source: El Financiero