Germany Looks All-In On Tesla After Musk Visits Gigafactory Berlin

Germany is home to many luxury auto brands like Audi AUDVF and BMW BMWYY. But now it looks like the German government is ready to support a rival to these established brands when it comes to the country's support for Tesla Inc TSLA.

In a report from Bloomberg, it was noted that Peter Altmaier, Germany's economy minister, promised Tesla CEO Elon Musk the country would help Tesla in whatever way was needed to get Gigafactory Berlin up and running.

“We are very proud of your car plant in Brandenburg and we wish you good luck with that,” Altmaier said. Musk landed in Germany on Sept. 1, to tour the CureVac facility where Tesla is helping build machines used to produce a COVID-19 vaccine.

Tesla's Gigafactory Berlin started construction in June and has been making rapid progress. The company hopes to have cars rolling off the production line by July 2021. Nearby, a battery production facility is also being built by Tesla, to make batteries for European produced cars.

Benzinga's Take: It's pretty interesting to see the German government embrace a challenger to the country's own vehicle brands. Germans are notorious for their loyalty to German automakers. A Tesla factory, employing thousands of workers, could help Germans and other Europeans make a more serious consideration for Tesla's clean energy vehicles in the future.

Photo courtesy of Elon Musk on Twitter