TeslaThis weekend, the long Robotakshi will finally hit the street, but the rollout could face some obstacles.
The Elon Musk-led electric car company is set to deploy Robotaxis in Austin, Texas on June 22, making its first driverless trip to the customer home, expected for its birthday on June 28th.
Musk shared news of her tentative debut last week in a post on social media platform X.
Here’s what we know about Tesla events so far:
When and where
The release includes a limited number of Tesla vehicles that will debut in Austin on June 22nd. The first ride is in the Model Y, not the Cyber ​​Cub, which was announced in October.
Vehicles and vehicles are accessible by invitation only. Some social media influencers report receiving early access invitations to test new services starting Sunday.
Tesla Fan, shareholder and promoter Sawyer Merritt posted details of Musk’s X’s invitation.
Travelling to the airport is excluded.
Vehicles are limited to city Geofykens areas, and remote drivers are monitored as backups.
Musk told CNBC’s David Faber that Robotaxis only operates in parts of Austin. The company said it “deems safest,” while Tesla said it was “looking” at the car at its remote operations center.
Can Musk fulfill his promise?
Musk has long promoted the unmanned Robotaki, and pressure is on the billionaire to fulfill his promise. As early as 2019, Musk said he is “very confident” when Robotaxis is released in 2020.
In May, Musk confirmed plans to debut the service in Austin this month, and was later set up for launches for Los Angeles and San Francisco. At the time, Musk said the service would be launched with 10 vehicles circulating through Austin.
“It’s wise to start with a few and make sure things are going well and scale it,” he told CNBC’s Faber.
Wall Street analysts such as Wedbush’s Dan Ives believe Robotaxis will lead a “golden age of Tesla’s autonomy” with powering market capitalization of more than $2 trillion by the end of next year.
This is twice the market value since the end of Wednesday.
“There are many set-offs… But considering its unparalleled scale and range worldwide, we believe Tesla has the opportunity to own an autonomous market and delegate its technology to other car players around the US and around the world,” he wrote in the memo.
Tesla, once considered a technology leader in autonomous driving, is now a laguard. alphabet– US-owned Waymo
Waymo, who said it had reached 10 million trips in May, already runs a fleet of commercial Robotaxis across the US, and is also seeking permission to test autonomous vehicles equipped with human safety drivers in New York City.
Opposition to regulatory hurdles
Tesla faces bumpy roads ahead, littered with regulatory hurdles and pushbacks from lawmakers.
On Wednesday, a group of Texas Democrats called for Texas to push the launch of Robotaki until September 1st, and until Texas rolls out a new slate for the autonomous driving law.
“We believe this is the greatest benefit of both public safety and the construction of public transport,” the group said in a letter to Tesla’s field quality director, Eddie Gates. They also sought “details to show that Tesla is compliant with the new law.”
Public safety advocates protested the launch in Austin earlier this month.
A group known as The Dawn Project, a high-tech safety organization critical of Tesla’s autonomous capabilities, has demonstrated the Tesla Model Y, where the now-available “full-self-driving” software has passed a school bus where it has stopped and hit a child-sized mannequin. The group said the software is a situation where it misinterprets elements of the road.
“Humans… they would have followed the law when they saw the lights flashing. They would have stopped,” Dan O’Doud, founder of the Dawn Project, told CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street” on Friday.
O’Dowd, who also runs Green Hills Software, a company that sells technology to Tesla’s competitors, told CNBC that the software “is not approaching anywhere” and shouldn’t go on the streets.
“The software doesn’t know how to recognize school buses,” he said.
Tesla’s FSD features, featuring standard FSD or FSD supervision, include automatic steering and parking, but data tracked by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, are linked to accidents and deaths.
Stock charts from 2018 to today.
Tesla is under fire
The Tesla brand has earned several hits in recent months along with a decline in sales and reputation damage related to mask political activities.
Musk is a major supporter of President Donald Trump, leading the government’s Department of Efficiency, focusing hundreds of millions of people on a reelection campaign that would later lead the government’s Department of Efficiency, which aimed to reduce costs. He left the department at the end of May.
Musk’s close relationship with the Trump White House has led owners to let go of the brand, leading to violence in some cases, with showrooms and vehicles targeting arson and vandalism attacks.
But Musk and Trump’s relationship worsened earlier this month after Tech Titan denounced the president’s spending bill on X, leading to a massive sale of the stock. He later apologized for the social media posts, with some saying they “going too far.”
EV manufacturers also place emphasis on declining global sales in major markets such as the US and Europe. Vehicle sales in Europe accounted for 49% from a year ago in April, while global first quarter delivery fell 13%.
This decline was linked to a combination of mask politics and strengthening competition in the EV market.
– Lora Kolodny of CNBC contributed to this report.
