Promised
A captive advanced-packaging / process node so neither company sits in a TSMC queue forever — inference for cars and bots, silicon for AI satellites.
Gold-lane node · merge relevance 98
Terafab — the shared chip moonshot
A cited ~$55B-class captive advanced-packaging / process node that would feed Tesla inference and SpaceX AI satellites. Framework agreement exists. Projects still “subject to separate negotiations.” Score it as a letter of intent, not a factory.
Completion
8%
5–12%
Merge relevance
98
Relevance
Cited bill
~$55B
$40.0B–$70.0B
Tesla inference Cars · Optimus · Cortex
TERAFAB shared node
SpaceX silicon AI sats · Starlink V3
Today both companies are tenants. Terafab is the argument they should not be.
Shipped
A cited number, a framework agreement, and a name in a bio. Related-party talk. Not a clean room.
Missing
The fab. The process. The $55B. The talent. Customers other than themselves. CHIPS / CFIUS path. Transfer pricing a Tesla minority holder can audit.
Why this is the merge trench
Highest merge-relevance node in the set (98). Not because a factory exists — because the bill is large enough that combining the P&Ls is the only politically honest way to eat it. Tesla holders funding a fab for SpaceX sats is the conflict. A merger collapses the related-party file. That is the trench.
- Shared necessity40/40
- Bill neither wants alone30/30
- Agency conflict20/20
- Execution (LOI is real, fab is not)8/10
- Total98/100
IN TRENCHES
This is not a fab
No public yield. No wafer starts as a Tesla/SpaceX plant. Elon’s bio pointing at Terafab is not a process node. 5–12% complete, estimated from public artifacts.
The bill neither wants alone
Cost to date is unknown design/pre-fab spend ($0.2–2B range). Cost to finish is the cited ~$55B-class ($40–70B). Value if hit: inference independence for cars, bots, sats (~$300B option). Value if miss: both remain Nvidia/TSMC tenants; the merge case weakens (~−$80B).
Cost to date
$200M–$2.0B
Unknown — design/pre-fab spend; estimate range
Cost to finish
$40.0B–$70.0B
Cited ~$55B-class. Shared bill.
Value if hit
$300.0B
Inference independence for cars, bots, sats
Value if miss
−$80.0B
Both remain Nvidia/TSMC tenants; merge case weakens
$ / remaining point
$598M
Remaining cost divided by remaining %. A 90%-done cheap item does not look like a 15%-done civilization-scale item.
Hit $300.0B · Miss −$80.0B
Engineering gates
- Process node choice
- Advanced packaging
- Talent
- Yield
Regulatory gates
- CHIPS / CFIUS
- Export controls
- State incentives