Tesla has posted Terafab job openings in Palo Alto and Austin for roles such as module process engineers with lithography expertise, with base salaries ranging from about $88,000 to $240,000 depending on experience.

The Terafab initiative signals a bold vertical integration move for Tesla and SpaceX, but recruiting enough engineers remains a major hurdle.

SpaceX previously invested about $280 million last year to expand its semiconductor R&D and packaging facilities in Bastrop, Texas.

SpaceX and Tesla did not respond to requests for comment at the time of reporting.

Terafab embodies a vertical integration strategy intended to control design, fabrication, and packaging, potentially easing supply chain constraints and accelerating design iterations.

Elon Musk publicly announced Terafab plans, underscoring the ambition of the project.

Musk’s Terafab plan includes in-house lithography mask production to speed chip design iterations, with references to leveraging new physics to enable the approach.

Tesla and SpaceX are aggressively hiring engineers for the Terafab chip manufacturing project, aiming to build one of the world’s largest semiconductor facilities and bring design, fabrication, and packaging under one roof.

The Terafab division is also seeking process integration engineers to design advanced logic chips, offering base salaries from roughly $88,000 to $338,280, and plans to combine logic and memory production in a single campus.

Progress hinges on attracting and retaining skilled semiconductor engineers amid fierce industry competition.

A global talent shortage in specialized semiconductor engineering presents a core challenge for Terafab.

Competition from major players like TSMC and other industry peers compounds recruitment difficulties for Terafab.