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Robin Ren, Musk's former Penn lab partner, is recruited to tackle Tesla's struggling China business. Through persistent lobbying of the Chinese government, Ren secures an unprecedented deal allowing Tesla to build a factory without forming a joint venture, fundamentally shifting China's manufacturing policy. The Shanghai Gigafactory begins production in October 2019 and quickly becomes Tesla's largest manufacturing hub.

Robin Ren, who studied physics with Musk at Penn and took a cross-country road trip with him after graduation in 1995, had little auto industry experience when Musk unexpectedly contacted him twenty years later over lunch in Palo Alto. Tesla was struggling in China despite aggressive expansion plans, prompting Musk to ask for advice. When Musk mentioned meeting with China's vice premier, Ren agreed to accompany him despite having just returned from a business trip. During meetings with Chinese officials, advisors explained that Chinese law required any foreign automaker to form a joint venture with a domestic company. Musk, resistant to sharing control, humorously deflected by comparing Tesla to a toddler too young for marriage. On the flight home, Musk offered Ren a position at Tesla. Rather than convince Musk to accept a joint venture as other automakers had done, Ren chose the bolder strategy of lobbying China's government to change three decades of manufacturing law. With Musk also making trips to meet Chinese leaders, they framed Tesla's factory as aligned with President Xi Jinping's clean-energy innovation agenda. In early 2018, China agreed to allow Tesla to build without a joint venture, and Ren negotiated over two hundred acres near Shanghai plus favorable financing. When Ren pitched the deal to Musk in February 2018 during Tesla's Nevada production crisis, Musk barely examined the presentation materials. Instead, he stared out the plane window, then looked Ren in the eye and asked simply if he believed it was right. Upon Ren's affirmative answer, Musk approved the deal. The formal signing ceremony occurred on July 10, 2018, with Musk arriving directly from Thailand after delivering a mini-submarine to rescue trapped soccer players. Production began in October 2019, and within two years the Shanghai facility was manufacturing over half of Tesla's global vehicles.