The Race to Dominate the EV Market

Tesla’s gigafactory in Nevada, producing batteries on a huge scale for the company’s electric vehicles (EVs), is bound to be the building with the largest footprint on Earth once fully completed. In contrast, British start-up Arrival is turning ex warehouses into microfactories, with plans to build a second microfactory in the United States that offers ultra-flexible production. What’s the best approach? Here Claudia Jarrett, US country manager at automation parts supplier EU Automation, delves into the pros and cons of both gigafactories and microfactories. With an astounding floor space of 5.3 million square feet and an impressive array of cutting-edge production technologies, Giga Nevada, also known as Gigafactory 1, stands in sharp contrast with the desert landscape in which it’s situated. In perspective, its total floor space distributed on several levels occupies the equivalent of about 90 football fields—and the already built portion represents only 30% of the final project.