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(CNN Business) -
Tesla's corporate headquarters will have a new home.
"I am pleased to announce that we will be moving our headquarters to Austin, Texas," CEO Elon Musk said during a Tesla shareholders meeting Thursday.
The electric car company is currently based in Palo Alto, California, near its original headquarters in San Carlos and its first factory in Fremont.
Musk said Thursday that there is a "limit to how big you can climb in the Bay Area."
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He cited housing affordability and long commutes as obstacles to its current location, and said the Austin factory is five minutes from the airport and 15 minutes from downtown.
The median home price in Palo Alto is $ 3.3 million, according to Realtor.com, while the median home price in Austin is $ 588,000.
Musk himself said in December that he moved to Texas, and one of his other companies, SpaceX, is developing a massive rocket system known as the "Starship" in South Texas.
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Despite the move, Musk said Tesla (TSLA) plans to continue expanding "significantly" in California.
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"This is not about Tesla leaving California," he said.
He added that the company intended to increase production from its Fremont and Nevada factories by 50%.
Tesla could not be reached for further comment Thursday night.
The company does not usually interact with the traditional media.
In May, Musk said in a series of tweets that Tesla would move the company's headquarters to Texas or Nevada.
That came after a dispute between Musk and Alameda County, California officials over the safety of the Tesla factory in Fremont due to the coronavirus pandemic.
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