Make your robotaxi predictions for the 8/8 reveal

So Elon says that Tesla will reveal a dedicated robotaxi vehicle on 8/8. What do you think we will see? Will it look like this concept art or something else?

I will say that while this concept drawing looks super cool, I am a bit skeptical if it is practical as a robotaxi. It looks to only have 2 seats which would be fine for 1-2 people who need a ride but would not work for more than 2 people. I feel like that would limit the robotaxis value for a lot of people. Also, it would likely need a steering wheel and pedals for regulatory reasons even if Tesla did achieve eyes-off capability.

So I think this is concept art for a hypothetical 2 seater, cheap Tesla, not a robotaxi.

Could the robotaxi look more like this concept art but smaller? It could look a bit more like say the Zoox vehicle or the Cruise Origin, more futuristic box like shape IMO and seat 5-6 people.

Or maybe the robotaxi will look more like the "model 2" concept:

Other questions:
- Will the robotaxis be available to own by individuals as a personal car or will it strictly be owned by Tesla and only used in a ride-hailing network?
- What will cost be?
- Will it have upgraded hardware? Radar? Lidar? additional compute?
- Will Elon reveal any details on how the ride-hailing network will work?

Thoughts? Let the fun speculation begin!

 

[diplomat33]

I think Waymo intervenes far more than you think.

I can't find any published data, but Cruise was intervening every 5 miles on average.

I was talking about collision rate. But I doubt that Waymo is doing remote interventions every 5 miles. That would be insanely bad. Waymo is doing 50,000 rides per week now. There is no way they could be doing that if they had to intervene every 5 miles. That would mean like 50,000 remote interventions per week, assuming each ride is about 5 miles. Cruise was doing remote interventions every 5 miles because their tech sucked. Hence why they had so many incidents, they had to shut down and were not good enough to scale driverless at the rate they wanted to do. Waymo's tech is way more reliable than Cruise.

 

[aronth5]

Well over half is not good enough. Even 99% is not good enough. And, while we are at it, L3 is not good enough.

For little kids, yes, it will be.

I never said L3 was good enough. Just pointing out that for those FSD owners who have no interest in Robotaxi, which is the vast majority, L3 is definitely an option for Tesla if they chose to implement it. You need to think out of the box on L3. Tesla could first implement L3 on controlled access highways which in the US is a significant percentage of the roadway. Owners could then read, text and watch videos. That would be helpful and drive the take rate. Tesla could also expand that to include city/streets. Perhaps limited but the beauty of L3 is there is no definition as to what is included and what isn't. Just look at Mercedes dumb implementation.

 

[aataskin]

I never said L3 was good enough. Just pointing out that for those FSD owners who have no interest in Robotaxi, which is the vast majority, L3 is definitely an option for Tesla if they chose to implement it. You need to think out of the box on L3. Tesla could first implement L3 on controlled access highways which in the US is a significant percentage of the roadway. Owners could then read, text and watch videos. That would be helpful and drive the take rate. Tesla could also expand that to include city/streets. Perhaps limited but the beauty of L3 is there is no definition as to what is included and what isn't. Just look at Mercedes dumb implementation.

Tesla could do all of this, and Musk has promised as much and more, but it hasn't happened yet for some reason. Looking at the Merc's "dumb implementation", they take full legal liability when the car is in control, same as Waymo, and which is something that any other robotaxi will have to provide. Do you think Tesla will announce something like that on the 8/8?

 

[enemji]

I was talking about collision rate. But I doubt that Waymo is doing remote interventions every 5 miles. That would be insanely bad. Waymo is doing 50,000 rides per week now. There is no way they could be doing that if they had to intervene every 5 miles. That would mean like 50,000 remote interventions per week, assuming each ride is about 5 miles. Cruise was doing remote interventions every 5 miles because their tech sucked. Hence why they had so many incidents, they had to shut down and were not good enough to scale driverless at the rate they wanted to do. Waymo's tech is way more reliable than Cruise.

Look at the Baidu robocar. All the time the reporter got a Baidu supposedly AV/RT driven by a driver. It took 4 hrs for the reporter to get a AV/RT.

 

[Daniel in SD]

Looks like some of the slides from the 8/8 event have leaked.

 

[aataskin]

Look at the Baidu robocar. All the time the reporter got a Baidu supposedly AV/RT driven by a driver. It took 4 hrs for the reporter to get a AV/RT.

Why do we need to look at Baidu, or Merc or Cruise or anything else? The question is, which tech, if any, will Tesla unveil on the 8/8 that will allow it to make a very sizeable step towards autonomous driving from where it currently is, and what type of autonomous driving they decided to go for. I don't believe anything else, like how that car will look like, or how it's going to be cleaned, or how stupid Merc's autopilot is, or anything else like this is even remotely as intriguing as this.

 

[aronth5]

Tesla could do all of this, and Musk has promised as much and more, but it hasn't happened yet for some reason. Looking at the Merc's "dumb implementation", they take full legal liability when the car is in control, same as Waymo, and which is something that any other robotaxi will have to provide. Do you think Tesla will announce something like that on the 8/8?

Highly doubt Tesla will do this initially but perhaps in the future. Elon has never mentioned L3 as far as I know. His focus has always been the Robotaxi service with existing car owners able to have their car join the fleet. You have to wonder though what Tesla will do for the potentially millions of Tesla owners who have no interest of joining the fleet (like me) but want the ability to read, watch videos, text etc? I don't expect much clarification on 8/8. I think the unveiling is mostly about the Robotaxi vehicle itself.

 

[diplomat33]

The question is, which tech, if any, will Tesla unveil on the 8/8 that will allow it to make a very sizeable step towards autonomous driving from where it currently is, and what type of autonomous driving they decided to go for.

If you are expecting radar/lidar redundancy on the Tesla robotaxi, I think you will be disappointed. I think it is a pretty safe bet that the robotaxi will be vision-only. My guess is that the robotaxi will use "HW5". It will have higher resolution cameras than our cars and the more powerful FSD computer, that's it. They might add some extra cameras but that is about it IMO. I do think 8/8 will focus on the vehicle itself (and the ride-hailing app), not on any new autonomous driving tech. Remember, Elon thinks autonomous driving is basically solved already. So from his point of view, Tesla does not need any new tech. He will show off the cool looking robotaxi vehicle and claim that pending more E2E training, everything will be solved "soon".

 

[DrChaos]

If you are expecting radar/lidar redundancy on the Tesla robotaxi, I think you will be disappointed. I think it is a pretty safe bet that the robotaxi will be vision-only. My guess is that the robotaxi will use "HW5". It will have higher resolution cameras than our cars and the more powerful FSD computer, that's it. They might add some extra cameras but that is about it IMO. I do think 8/8 will focus on the vehicle itself (and the ride-hailing app), not on any new autonomous driving tech. Remember, Elon thinks autonomous driving is basically solved already. So from his point of view, Tesla does not need any new tech. He will show off the cool looking robotaxi vehicle and claim that pending more E2E training, everything will be solved "soon".

I hope at least the engineers can convince Elon to at least let them use stereo cameras and infrared. Lidar will be a never but maybe imaging radars I hope.

And Robotaxis is a great example of where Elon hype and bullishness will clash with reality. Waymo had superficially great driving 7 years ago, and yet it still takes a very long time to get reliable enough and the service issues worked out to be worth any revenue.

It will look "good enough" much earlier than it is good enough and Elon will have fits with the pushback and will fire many people but not improve the situation.

 

[enemji]

Why do we need to look at Baidu, or Merc or Cruise or anything else?

Cuz everyone of them is getting creative and fudging data

 

[enemji]

Looks like some of the slides from the 8/8 event have leaked.
View attachment 1058167
View attachment 1058166

I told you so…. Model 3 is it

 

[DrChaos]

I told you so…. Model 3 is it

its possible these are fakes. But it makes sense too to not have any new platform for robo.

It was idiotic to delete the low cost platform production

you want a low cost platform for human and robo driving to be shared to have the highest possible volume, high reliability and low incremental cost. That's the way to beat Waymo: cheap. And that comes from having 5 years of human-driven cars selling on the platform.

There will be some modifications needed like automatic door closers and sensors on the door outsides.

 

[Daniel in SD]

its possible these are fakes. But it makes sense too to not have any new platform for robo.

Found the entire slide deck. Would be a lot of work to fake this.

Tesla Autonomy Investor Day Slides — The Tesla Show

Slides from Tesla’s Autonomy Investor Day.

theteslashow.com

 

[enemji]

Found the entire slide deck. Would be a lot of work to fake this.

Tesla Autonomy Investor Day Slides — The Tesla Show

Slides from Tesla’s Autonomy Investor Day.

theteslashow.com

That deck is from 2020

 

[Daniel in SD]

That deck is from 2020

2019
Seems like they can just reuse it though.

 

[ThomasD]

When will the Tesla charging Snake be released?

Robotic-snake car charger revealed

An electric car charger that can find its own way into a vehicle has been unveiled by Tesla.

www.bbc.com

 

[Daniel in SD]

When will the Tesla charging Snake be released?

Robotic-snake car charger revealed

An electric car charger that can find its own way into a vehicle has been unveiled by Tesla.

www.bbc.com

It has been superceded by Tesla bot. Buying a specialized robot is like buying a horse.

 

[JulienW]

When will the Tesla charging Snake be released?

Robotic-snake car charger revealed

An electric car charger that can find its own way into a vehicle has been unveiled by Tesla.

www.bbc.com

Two weeks

 

[RDoc]

I was talking about collision rate. But I doubt that Waymo is doing remote interventions every 5 miles. That would be insanely bad. Waymo is doing 50,000 rides per week now. There is no way they could be doing that if they had to intervene every 5 miles. That would mean like 50,000 remote interventions per week, assuming each ride is about 5 miles. Cruise was doing remote interventions every 5 miles because their tech sucked. Hence why they had so many incidents, they had to shut down and were not good enough to scale driverless at the rate they wanted to do. Waymo's tech is way more reliable than Cruise.

You really need to rethink your use of math and reason. You're going to be sitting at the Nerd table at lunch if you keep it up.
You've been warned!

 

[Krash]

…You're going to be sitting at the Nerd table at lunch if you keep it up…

There are other tables besides the nerd table?