Tesla CEO Elon Musk expressed his expectations for the automaker to achieve full autonomy this year during the conference call on April 20, 2023.
“…For those that are using the FSD beta, I think you can see the improvements are really quite dramatic. There’ll be a little bit of two steps forward, one step back between releases for those trying the beta. But the trend is very clearly towards full self-driving, towards full autonomy. And I hesitate to say this, but I think we’ll do it this year. So that’s what it looks like.”
CEO Elon Musk
This projection is in response to the skepticism among analysts and investors regarding Tesla’s market value, which has been affected by various factors like price cuts. In Q1 2023, the automaker’s gross margin was 3% short of the market’s expectations of 22.4%.
“Tesla faces an increasingly uphill battle to secure its competitive position, which makes its current valuation look even more unrealistic. The Tesla bull case has centered around the company’s growth goals, which it is failing to meet.”
David Trainer, New Constructs CEO
However, CEO Musk insists that the automaker is willing to sacrifice profit to achieve growth.
“We’ve taken the view that pushing for higher volumes and a larger fleet is the right choice here, versus a lower volume and higher margin. However, we expect our vehicles over time will be able to generate significant profit through autonomy.”
CEO Elon Musk
Tesla FSD pricing
He was also asked regarding FSD take rates and if Tesla would reduce pricing for the semi-autonomous driving feature. In response, he asserted that autonomous cars’ value is “enormous,” making it hard to consider price cuts.
“It’s a tricky pricing question, because the value of a car that is autonomous is enormous. So in a way, the price right now is an option value on an autonomous vehicle. And that value is — that will ultimately be very significant.”
CEO Elon Musk
As of now, Tesla sells the full self-driving software for $15,000. In contrast to its name, the technology does not make the car autonomous as it still requires a human driver.
“We’re the only ones making cars that technically, we could sell for zero profit for now and then yield actually tremendous economics in the future through autonomy. I’m not sure how many people will appreciate the profundity of what I’ve just said, but it is extremely significant.”
CEO Elon Musk
See Also:
- Tesla officially begins FSD Beta v11.3.2 deployment
- Tesla delivers hardware 4 computers (FSD2)-equipped vehicles
- Tesla secures European approval to launch its latest FSD Hardware 4.0
- New penalty imposed on Tesla drivers when found inattentive during FSD Mode
- Tesla to allow FSD Beta customers to disable steering wheel nags in January
As we all know, Tesla has been developing a fully autonomous vehicle. In recent remarks, Musk has even claimed that the company’s upcoming car will run “almost entirely in autonomous mode.”
Undoubtedly, Tesla has made outstanding advancements in the Full Self-Driving Beta program. However, we cannot really say how close Tesla is to a 100% autonomous car or Robotaxi fleet.
