Multi-billionaire Elon Musk's rocket company SpaceX has announced that it will build its largest launch site yet in the southern US state of Louisiana.
Construction of the $100bn (£73bn) project - named Starbase, Louisiana - is due to start next year, with the 125,000-acre (50,585-hectare) site expanding on the company's operations beyond its current Texas headquarters and locations in Florida.
It will be used to "support thousands of Starship flights a year with missions launching to Earth orbit, the Moon, Mars and beyond," SpaceX said on Tuesday.
In June, SpaceX shares started trading on New York's technology-focused Nasdaq in the world's biggest ever stock market debut.
SpaceX said it aims to launch its first Starship flight from the new Louisiana base in 2029.
The facility will add more than 3,000 jobs to the region, the company said.
The Louisiana Economic Development agency said the average wage of workers at the base - the largest of its kind in the world - would be 192% more than the region's current average salary.
It will also create more than 8,100 new jobs indirectly, the agency estimated.
"The historic project will establish Louisiana as a global hub for next-generation aerospace, with the capacity and infrastructure needed to dramatically increase launch frequency and expand access to space," it added.
The facility in Louisiana will share its name with another SpaceX site on the southern tip of Texas.
In 2025, residents in an area of Cameron County, where the company has testing and development operations, approved incorporating the patch of land as a city called Starbase.
Musk has set out ambitious goals for SpaceX, including plans to reach Mars, develop artificial intelligence (AI) models and launch data centres into space.
In August, SpaceX and Tesla - Musk's electric vehicle and robotics firm - announced plans to build a $16.8bn artificial intelligence (AI) chip making complex in Texas called the Terafab.
The facility aims to meet the companies' growing demand for computing power to support its projects including developing AI and robotics technology over the coming years.
The newly-listed SpaceX is under pressure to convince investors that it will be profitable even as it pursues its expansion plans.
Its shares have tumbled by more than 30% from the highs reached shortly after it began trading but are still higher than their $135 offer price.
Source: BBC
--Agencies
