PALO ALTO, U.S. -- Tesla held its annual shareholder meeting in its Austin, Texas, Gigafactory for the first time on Thursday and announced it will move its headquarters to the southern state from its longtime base in Fremont, California.

The U.S. EV-maker said it will continue to expand production in California despite the move -- though the company also revealed that in terms of output, its Fremont factory had been overtaken by its Shanghai plant.

"We are continuing to expand our activity to California. It is not a matter of Tesla leaving California. Our intention is actually to increase output from Fremont and from Giga Nevada by 50%," CEO Elon Musk said at the online-only shareholder meeting on Thursday.

Tesla's Austin Gigafactory broke ground in August 2020 and is still under construction. The company said it is aiming to begin production there by the end of 2021.

Last year, Musk publicly criticized California's COVID-19 lockdown restrictions, which shut down Tesla's plant in Fremont -- the company's main production hub at the time -- and called the state government officials "fascist" in an earnings call in April 2020.

Tesla followed this up by filing a lawsuit against Alameda County, where its Fremont factory is based. In a tweet, Musk alleged the local government violated "constitutional freedoms" and said it was the "final straw" that pushed the company to consider relocating its headquarters to Texas or Nevada immediately.

The tech billionaire sold his properties in Los Angeles and moved to Austin in 2020.

"It's tough for people to afford houses [in California] ... There's a limit to how you can scale it in the [San Francisco] Bay Area," Musk said on Thursday.

Meanwhile, Tesla has been ramping up production at its Shanghai Gigafactory as demand grows both in China and for exports.

"Shanghai Giga has done an incredible job and now exceeds Fremont in production," Musk said.

Thanks to the China boost, Tesla delivered 241,300 vehicles globally in the July to September quarter, up 73% from a year earlier, despite "global supply chain and logistics challenges."

The company does not break down deliveries by country. However, according to data from the China Passenger Car Association, around 44,264 vehicles were shipped from the Shanghai Gigafactory in August, including 31,379 units for export and 12,885 sold domestically.

Meanwhile, Tesla said the global chip crunch will continue to affect its production and is weighing on its margins.

"We are seeing significant cost pressure in our supply chain, and so we've had to increase vehicle prices, at least temporarily," said Musk.

"But we do hope to actually reduce the prices over time and make them more affordable," he added.