The Tesla Gigafactory, which began producing lithium-ion battery cells last year, will soon start producing other parts of Tesla's electric vehicles.
In this week's State of the State address, Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval announced plans for Tesla to manufacture electric motors and gearboxes for its Model 3 vehicles.
Pleased to announce that @TeslaMotors will expand its investment in #NV by producing electric motors & gearboxes at #Gigafactory #nvsots
— Governor Sandoval (@GovSandoval) January 18, 2017
The luxury automaker's expansion means another $350 million investment in the Silver State, as well as the addition of 550 new jobs, according to the Reno Gazette-Journal, which counted an existing 1,000 full-time factory workers.
Neither Tesla nor Gov. Sandoval immediately responded to PCMag's request for comment.
After more than two years of construction, the Tesla Gigafactory, located about 20 miles east of Reno, started production of electric car batteries in 2016. The plant is expected to achieve full capacity by 2018.
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In addition to batteries, it will eventually churn out complete Tesla vehicles—500,000 per year, the company said. Production on that scale is crucial to the success of Tesla's upcoming Model 3: a $35,000, 215-mile-range sedan that CEO Elon Musk is positioning as an electric car for the masses.
For now, most of Tesla's manufacturing takes place at its Fremont, Calif., factory: a 5.3-million-square-foot facility formerly owned by General Motors that began making Model S vehicles in 2012.
The finished portions of the Gigafactory, by contrast, already cover 5.5 million square feet, and once the entire facility is complete, it will span the length of 107 NFL football fields, according to The Verge, which tipped a total of 10 million-plus square feet of operational space.