Ernest Padovano yNP3

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk explained that the company is forcing chip manufacturing partners to move much faster than traditional semiconductor timelines in the race to scale the next generation of artificial intelligence hardware.
32. Speaking during a virtual conversation with investor Ron Baron at the annual Baron Investment Conference, Musk said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSM) and Samsung Electronics Co. (SSNLF) he said he had “great respect”.
Stating that Tesla and SpaceX have worked with both over the years, Musk added that even the world's leading foundries could not keep up with Tesla's pace:
“It doesn't seem fast enough, and when I ask how long it will take to build a new chip factory from start to finish, they tell me five years to reach empty production. For me, five years are like eternity,” he said, explaining that the planning horizon is closer to one to two years. Jokingly, he said that in the third year, the timeline reached "eternity".
Although TSMC and Samsung acknowledged that they were "acting like lightning," suppliers warned that if the company could not meet the company's aggressive demand for the artificial intelligence chip, the speed still risks being the "elimination factor" for Tesla.
Musk also confirmed that Tesla's upcoming AI5 and AI6 chips will be manufactured at both Samsung's Taylor, Texas facility and TSMC's Fab 21 in Arizona. This happened despite previous statements that Samsung could carry out production alone.
Musk said the chips will look a little different depending on the factory due to manufacturing translation differences, but Tesla's software will work the same on both versions.
The company plans to start producing the AI5 in 2026, and the AI6 will arrive in about a year. Musk reiterated that AI5 is expected to provide a 40-fold performance increase compared to Tesla's current generation, while AI6 targets about twice that.
Meanwhile, in November 2025, NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang warned Musk not to underestimate the difficulty of building an advanced chip factory after the Tesla boss announced an internal factory plan that could produce a million artificial intelligence chips a month.
Speaking in Taiwan, Huang said that building a high-tech semiconductor plant is “extremely difficult” and stated that success requires not only infrastructure, but also deep engineering expertise, which makes TSMC the best foundry in the world.
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