Model 3 not what Elon intended?

[Hertog_Martin]

I recently saw a video that talked about how the Model 3 is designed for an Autonomous Ride Sharing Fleet and that the presentation of the Model 3 and Tesla's little attention for it since then is all part of an anti-sell preventing a too high number of reservations and upselling to the Model S/X. Word of extremely low TCOS thanks to ability to enter ride sharing fleet would be so disruptive it's too much attention.

This idea is great, and as a reservation holder myself I would love it.

However, EAP is already longer underway to being what it is supposed to be and full self drive was once estimated by Musk to be possible in 2018, the year of the model 3, but is now acknowledged by Tesla and Volvo to be further away in the future than hoped.

What if the Model 3 was indeed designed for autonomous ride sharing fleet, which many design and functionality choices seem to support, but full self driving turned out to be unachievable in time, rendering the Model 3 still a great Tesla car, but not what Elon intended?

 

[Eclectic]

Then it would be like every other Tesla product...

 

[SteveG3]

I recently saw a video that talked about how the Model 3 is designed for an Autonomous Ride Sharing Fleet and that the presentation of the Model 3 and Tesla's little attention for it since then is all part of an anti-sell preventing a too high number of reservations and upselling to the Model S/X. Word of extremely low TCOS thanks to ability to enter ride sharing fleet would be so disruptive it's too much attention.

This idea is great, and as a reservation holder myself I would love it.

However, EAP is already longer underway to being what it is supposed to be and full self drive was once estimated by Musk to be possible in 2018, the year of the model 3, but is now acknowledged by Tesla and Volvo to be further away in the future than hoped.

What if the Model 3 was indeed designed for autonomous ride sharing fleet, which many design and functionality choices seem to support, but full self driving turned out to be unachievable in time, rendering the Model 3 still a great Tesla car, but not what Elon intended?

Musk's first expressed his sense of when FSD would be possible circa 2014. Though I don't remember precisely what year he estimated at the time, I'm pretty sure it was 2020 or later. He has subsequently moved that timeline up about a couple of years, and more recently pushed it back about 6 months to a year. That said, that was all about capability, as to regulatory allowance needed to actually see these cars on the road, he has consistently said several more years (not sure he ever explicitly said 3 years, but that's my sense).

Bottom line, at no time did Elon or Tesla ever think the cars would be part of an autonomous Tesla network in 2018. That said, there is nothing to stop Tesla from starting their network as something along the lines of Uber and/or ZipCar (company owned fleet with available to paying members) and/or RelayRides (peer-to-peer rental) long before FSD is street legal. Any of those will have added appeal beyond 99+% of cars on the road to many customers, particularly in large urban centers, based on all the vehicles being air quality friendly EVs... and the cars are already set up for cell phones to act as keys... so you may have an opportunity to offset your cost of ownership long before FSD is legal.