Mark your calendar: Tesla CEO Elon Musk said this afternoon that his electric car maker is fully committed to developing self-driving car technology, and Tesla’s robot taxi will be unveiled on August 8.
This announcement, Musk posted on X A strange day of reports and counter-reports came to an end Friday afternoon, with Tesla’s stock price on a roller coaster ride, falling 6 points on the day before recovering in after-hours trading. Earlier in the day, Reuters reported that Tesla had scrapped its long-gestating plan to develop affordable electric cars for the masses. “Next-generation” vehicles are widely seen as key to EV makers’ survival, especially as competition intensifies in the EV space. Tesla will focus on building robotaxis that will use much of the same hardware as low-cost vehicles, the news agency reported.
But Musk logged into the X website to deny at least part of the Reuters report. “Reuters lied (again),” he posted, but did not specify what error the news organization made. Hours later, he appeared to confirm part of the report, saying Tesla’s next product launch would focus on robotaxis.
This apparent turn is surprising for several reasons.
Tesla has promised but has yet to deliver true self-driving technology for years. In 2016, Tesla said all of its vehicles would be equipped with the hardware needed to drive themselves, allowing drivers to take naps or even take their cars off-road with no one inside.
In a “master plan” Musk released that year, he outlined a (still) future scenario where Tesla owners could share their self-driving cars with others. He wrote: “When true self-driving technology is approved by regulators, customers will be able to add your car to Tesla’s shared fleet with the click of a button on the Tesla mobile app and drive while you Let it generate income for you.” While at work or on vacation. In 2019, Musk told a room full of investors that the automaker would have “more than 1 million Tesla vehicles on the road with fully self-driving hardware” by next year. That didn’t happen.
Meanwhile, Tesla’s driver-assist technology, dubbed “Full Self-Driving,” is technically only “Level 2” on the five-point autonomy scale, meaning the car can only operate under driver supervision. Carry out autonomous driving. Tesla’s latest Autopilot software update is the first not labeled as a “beta” by the automaker.
Still, Tesla’s driver-assistance technology has been heavily criticized by the National Transportation Safety Board, the U.S. traffic safety regulator. A two-year investigation by China’s top road safety regulator concluded late last year that Tesla’s technology could be abused by drivers because it did not force them to pay attention while driving. Tesla said it disagreed with the regulator’s analysis and rolled out a fix to customers via an over-the-air software update. Tesla insists its driver assistance features are safer than human drivers.
What’s more, other self-driving car developers have also faced serious growing pains over the past five years. A technology once touted as “just around the corner” is proving more difficult and more expensive than originally planned. Now, years after most major auto and tech manufacturers pledged to roll out self-driving software, only a handful of major players remain. After billions of dollars in dedicated research and development and more than 7 million miles driven, Google spinoff Waymo only offers paid taxi services in two cities: Phoenix and San Francisco, though it plans to launch more in Austin, Texas, and Los Angeles. and Los Angeles launch service. The wider San Francisco Bay Area is coming soon. Cruise, owned by General Motors Co., another self-driving taxi competitor, suspended its entire service after a self-driving taxi struck and injured a pedestrian, sparking a conflict with California regulators. If Tesla wants to launch a robotaxi service everywhere its cars are sold, its plans will be more ambitious than those of rivals that have been grappling with self-driving problems for years.