Gigafactory Texas activates Cortex 2.0 compute and new Advanced Tech Fab

Tesla said on April 22 that it has started ramping additional artificial-intelligence compute at Gigafactory Texas and begun a Tesla-owned Research Fab on the Austin campus. (assets-ir.tesla.com) The disclosure came in Tesla’s first-quarter 2026 shareholder deck, which said the company is building more of the infrastructure and software behind its robotaxi and robotics businesses. (assets-ir.tesla.com) Tesla had already told investors in its fourth-quarter 2025 update that it was building Cortex 2 at Gigafactory Texas and expected to more than double onsite compute there in the first half of 2026, measured in Nvidia H100 equivalents. (assets-ir.tesla.com) In plain terms, the compute buildout is a data center next to the factory: racks of processors train Tesla’s driving and robot software, then run models that help those systems make decisions. (assets-ir.tesla.com 1) (assets-ir.tesla.com 2) The new fab is a different piece of the puzzle. Tesla said its partnership with SpaceX aims to build a large chip fabrication operation for logic, memory and advanced packaging, starting with a Tesla-owned Research Fab in Texas. (assets-ir.tesla.com) Tesla also said it completed the final chip design for its next-generation AI5 inference processor in April. Inference chips are the hardware that runs trained models in real time, inside products rather than in training clusters. (assets-ir.tesla.com) Gigafactory Texas is already Tesla’s global headquarters, a Model Y plant and the home of Cybertruck, spread across more than 10 million square feet on a 2,500-acre site outside Austin. (tesla.com) Tesla tied the spending directly to 2026 launches and ramps, including Robotaxi, Optimus, Megapack 3, Cybercab and the Tesla Semi. The company said it expects “substantially higher” capital spending this year across research and development, new factories and new capabilities. (news.alphastreet.com) (assets-ir.tesla.com) That makes the Texas site more than an auto plant. Tesla is turning the Austin campus into a combined factory, data center and chip-development base for the software and hardware it says will power its next businesses. (assets-ir.tesla.com)