Lifestyle
Why Tesla’s Fremont Factory needed to reopen, with or without permission
It was imperative for Tesla to reopen its Fremont factory.
Before I dive into my personal thoughts on Tesla’s reopening of its Fremont factory, I just want to reinforce that this is my opinion, and I know this may rub some people the wrong way, but that’s not the intent.
I really encourage anyone who reads this to E-Mail or Tweet me if you have a strong opinion that either agrees or disagrees with my point of view. I won’t take any of the other thoughts personally, as I think a massive part of being a better person is to look at varying points of view, especially ones that differ from my own.
With that being said, let’s get started.
Tesla “reopened” Fremont last Sunday, with some workers telling local media by sunrise on that following Monday morning that they had just completed a 12-hour shift at the plant. How Tesla managed to do this, I don’t know. I found it quite impressive that they were able to fly under the radar for as long as they did.
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Elon Musk had been in a heavy sparring session with Alameda County. After Gavin Newsom, the Governor of California, stated a collection of facilities would be able to reopen, Tesla immediately started making plans. And why shouldn’t they? Newsom’s orders applied to manufacturing businesses, among others. Last I checked, Tesla is an automotive manufacturer.
However, Alameda County wasn’t ready to give in. They wouldn’t let Tesla reopen, even though the Governor said it was okay as long as the business maintained health and safety standards. We already know Tesla is more than capable of doing that, considering Giga Shanghai has been up and running since February 10. China was the world epicenter of the virus, and the proper precautions were taken at the Tesla facility in Shanghai. This has led to the facility not only producing new variants and customizable features for the Model 3, but it seems they could be just half a year away from having Phase 2 complete. This would make the Model Y available in China very soon.
Then Tesla released the “Return to Work Playbook.” 38-pages of information that would lead to a safe and healthy work environment for the 10,000 people working at Fremont. Not only would it get Tesla back to cranking out electric vehicles, but it would help people get back to work.
I know that unemployment is available, and I know that people were not losing their benefits, but people do need to work. Tesla is still relatively young, and if the company didn’t start making cars again, people would lose benefits, their pay, and their jobs altogether.
But the impact of closing Tesla’s doors because of a lack of production is much more significant than 10,000 people losing their jobs in Fremont. We’re talking about Tesla employees across the world losing their jobs. Bigger than that, the fight for sustainable transportation and energy would also be set back once again, perhaps ten years or more.
It was evident to me (and Elon Musk) that drastic measures needed to be taken. Musk took it upon himself to call people back to work, and people who wanted to be there could. People that needed to stay home for their health were also allowed to do so.
This is how it should be during a pandemic. Things have seemed to settle down from what I understand, and there is probable cause to believe that figures may be skewed to an extent. However, there is no confirmation that this is the case, and we’ll probably never have one. But why not give people the option to go to work if they choose? This country thrived on businesses running and people working.
Despite all of the evidence that Tesla knew what it was doing, Alameda County did not want the factory to reopen. Musk took it in his own hands and opened the facility himself. This eventually led to some controversy, and people believed the automaker was getting preferential treatment.
Preferential treatment? How? This is the same company that was told it couldn’t open its doors just a day after the Governor said it could. How is that preferential treatment? Tesla literally had to take a huge gamble and open the factory under its own terms just to get some attention.
Look what happened. Tesla reopened, Alameda responded, Tesla gave the County its safety plan, and they’re going to open next week. They are slightly above “Minimum Basic Operations” currently, but next week it appears Tesla will be back to producing its industry-leading electric vehicles.
I know this is going to ruffle some feathers, but Tesla had to make a drastic move to get the County’s attention. They couldn’t be swept under the rug anymore, and they couldn’t continue to have their startup date pushed back. The future of the Earth depends on having these vehicles built.
TSLAQ might say, “It is just a ploy for Elon to put money in his pocket.” Well, news flash, he’s got plenty of it. I think he’s more concerned about the well-being of his employees at this point. He’s more concerned about saving the world from utter destruction if electric cars don’t become the “norm” of transportation soon.
That’s why his risky move to reopen Fremont in an unapproved setting was totally worth it. There is no reason anyone should have to stay home from work if they don’t think it is necessary. If you’re scared of the virus and believe you are in danger, then stay home, especially if you are given that option.
Tesla made the jump, and it worked out, and it may rub some people the wrong way. After all, not everyone is going to agree with you.
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Elon Musk
The Boring Company just doubled its tunneling power in Nashville
The Boring Company’s Prufrock MB2 is commissioned and ready to mine beneath Nashville’s streets.
The Boring Company’s second tunnel boring machine, Prufrock MB2, is officially ready to dig in Nashville. The company confirmed the news on X, posting: “Prufrock-MB2 is ready to mine in Nashville! MB2 commissioning is complete, including the brief 11 rpm rotation shown here. Will MB2 catch up to MB1, who had quite the head start? And Prufrock-MB3 ships in August!”
MB2 arrives with meaningful improvements over its predecessor. Lessons learned from the launch and operation of MB1 have already been applied to MB2 to improve efficiency and prepare the machine for launch.
Traditional tunnel boring machines operate in a stop-and-go cycle, digging roughly five feet, halt, erect precast concrete segments to line the tunnel wall, then resume. That repeated interruption is one of the main reasons conventional tunneling is slow and expensive. Prufrock is designed to install the tunnel liner simultaneously with mining, eliminating the need to stop every five feet. The machine also skips the need for excavated launch pits. Prufrock arrives on a truck, tilts down, and launches into the ground within 24 hours. And when the tunnel is complete, it emerges from the ground and drives to its next launch site on a trailer, eliminating the need for expensive cranes or pit excavation. The machine is also fully electric and runs with zero people in the tunnel during normal operations, controlled remotely from a surface operations center.
Prufrock-MB2 is ready to mine in Nashville! MB2 commissioning is complete, including the brief 11 rpm rotation shown here.
Will MB2 catch up to MB1, who had quite the head start?
And Prufrock-MB3 ships in August! pic.twitter.com/TTrMql2aRg
— The Boring Company (@boringcompany) June 17, 2026
It won’t be long before we hear of another major update on The Boring Company’s Music City Loop project – a planned underground transit network beneath Nashville that would move passengers in electric vehicles through a series of tunnels at highway speeds, and bypassing surface traffic entirely. Nashville was selected in part because of its strong rock conditions that suits the Prufrock machines well, and relatively less regulatory hurdles.
Progress has been steady on multiple fronts. All 37 permits and approvals required ahead of tunneling have been obtained, out of 45 total. Key wins include a fully executed TDOT tunnel permit authorizing 25 miles of tunnel, unanimous airport authority approval for a Nashville International Airport station, and the city’s first residential station agreement serving downtown tower residents.
With MB1 already tunneling, MB2 now commissioned, and MB3 shipping in August, Nashville is becoming something of a live proving ground for scaled tunnel boring. The broader ambition is not limited to one city. The Boring Company’s stated goal is to make underground transportation a practical alternative to surface roads across major metro areas. Nashville is one of many cities, including a successful Las Vegas tunnel system, where that idea is being put to the test at real speed.
Investor's Corner
Tesla unfolded its first European “folding Supercharger”
Tesla’s folding Supercharger just arrived in Europe and it changes how fast charging expands.
Tesla’s Folding Unit Supercharger has officially landed in Europe, with the company teasing a new installation in its effort for a broader rollout targeting major motorway rest stops across the European continent in Q3 2026. The arrival marks a notable shift in how Tesla is thinking about network expansion, moving from hardware performance alone to engineering the logistics chain itself.
While Tesla did not reveal the exact location for the new folding Supercharger in Europe, the photo shared on X heavily suggests that this maybe somewhere in Norway. Historically, whenever Tesla rolls out an entirely new infrastructure architecture in Europe, whether it was the original Supercharger stalls years ago or these brand-new modular V4 “Folding Units”, Norway is almost always the designated launch pad because of its unmatched EV adoption rate and supportive infrastructure
The Folding Unit, introduced in March 2026, is a factory pre-assembled V4 charging station built on an industrial hinge system mounted to a heavy-duty concrete base. The entire assembly arrives on site ready to unfold and connect. Tesla confirmed the units feature telescopic light poles specifically designed for easy transportation and fast on-site deployment, a detail that signals how carefully the logistics chain has been engineered alongside the hardware itself. The design allows 33% more stalls per delivery truck, cuts installation time roughly in half, and reduces overall deployment costs by more than 20% compared to traditional installations.
Tesla’s newest “Folding V4 Superchargers” are key to its most aggressive expansion yet
Tesla also noted telescopic light poles which provide benefits over traditional Supercharger installations that require fixed-height poles that are awkward to ship, slow to position on site, and often require separate crews and equipment to erect before charging hardware can even be staged. By engineering poles that compress for transit and extend on arrival, Tesla has removed one of the quieter bottlenecks in the physical deployment process. Every hour saved on a light pole installation is an hour redirected toward getting stalls energized. At scale, across dozens of new sites per quarter, those hours add up to a meaningful acceleration in how quickly a location goes from approved permit to serving its first customer.
Each Folding Unit pairs a single V4 power cabinet with eight charging posts. The V4 cabinet delivers up to 500 kW per stall for passenger vehicles and up to 1.2 MW for the Tesla Semi, supporting twice the stalls per cabinet at three times the power density of its predecessor. Longer cables make every new station immediately usable by non-Tesla vehicles, a priority as Tesla continues opening its network to Ford, GM, Rivian, Hyundai, Stellantis, and others.
As Teslarati reported when the Folding Unit was first unveiled, Tesla’s Gigafactory New York produced its final V3 Supercharger cabinet in March 2026 after more than seven years and 15,000 units, completing a full pivot to V4 production. The European arrival of the folding design is the next chapter in that transition.
Faster and cheaper deployment means Tesla can justify building in markets and corridors that were previously too expensive to serve, filling the coverage gaps that have slowed EV adoption outside major urban centers.
First Folding Unit Superchargers in Europe 🇪🇺 https://t.co/KNfYWJukkL pic.twitter.com/YR1udIpH1i
— Tesla Charging (@TeslaCharging) June 10, 2026
Elon Musk
SpaceXAI just launched into your kitchen with their new app
SpaceXAI just powered its first consumer app and it predicts what you want to buy.
SpaceXAI just made its first move into consumer AI, and it involves your grocery cart. On June 3, 2026, Gopuff and SpaceXAI announced the launch of Go, a Grok-powered shopping assistant built directly into the Gopuff app that predicts what you need before you even start searching for it.
Gopuff is an instant delivery platform that operates more than 400 micro-fulfillment centers across the U.S., delivering everyday essentials, snacks, drinks, and household items in as little as 15 minutes. It is not a restaurant delivery app or a marketplace. It owns its inventory, controls its warehouses, and handles its own logistics, which means it has built one of the most detailed consumer behavior datasets in retail over its 13-year history.
Go combines SpaceXAI’s advanced reasoning, voice, and image generation models with Gopuff’s dataset of hundreds of millions of orders and real-time cultural signals from X to prepare a suggested cart the moment a customer opens the app. It learns each shopper’s habits and automatically builds a personalized cart based on time of day, location, order history, and real-time indicators. Returning customers can check out with a single tap.
Rather than searching for specific items, users can describe a situation like a game-day party or the desire for a healthy breakfast and Go will assemble a cart automatically. It can also predict when shoppers are running low on items like coffee or paper towels and have them packed and delivered in under 15 minutes. Grok voice integration lets users talk to the app in plain conversational language and check out completely hands-free.
Gopuff co-founder and co-CEO Yakir Gola said: “Today, we believe the greatest friction left in commerce is not delivery or instantaneous access to the essentials customers need. It’s the moment before: the thinking, the deciding, the remembering. We’re combining Gopuff’s demand intelligence with xAI’s frontier reasoning to create an everyday shopping experience that feels like a true extension of you.”
Why SpaceX just made a $60 billion bet on AI coding ahead of historic IPO
The timing carries context beyond the product launch. SpaceXAI was formed after SpaceX completed an all-stock merger with Elon Musk’s xAI earlier this year, folding one of the most advanced AI labs in the world into the same corporate structure as the company preparing what could be the largest IPO in history. SpaceXAI is dipping into consumer-focused AI just as it prepares for its public debut, and while Musk has openly discussed building an everything app, this launch uses Grok to power another company’s product rather than launching a standalone consumer platform. Every consumer-facing deployment of Grok ahead of the IPO roadshow adds tangible evidence that SpaceXAI is not just an infrastructure play but a direct competitor in the AI application layer where OpenAI and Google are already fighting for dominance.
Tesla Full Self-Driving and App Connectivity save life in medical emergency
Elon Musk predicts Grok will start to challenge Hollywood by the end of 2026
