Tesla’s highly awaited humanoid robot prototype, most commonly known as Optimus or Tesla Bot, demonstrated significant improvements since its initial presentation on AI Day 2022, according to the new video CEO Elon Musk presented at the shareholder event on May 16.
What are the improvements?
The faceless bots effortlessly walked through the Tesla office, marking a significant improvement from the dismal AI Day presentation from the previous year.
In retrospect, Tesla staff had only configured the bot to wave to the audience and held it on a stand at the time.
Finally, five Tesla Bots showcased their new capabilities, such as the following:
- Walk smoothly (but slowly)
- Motor torque control
- Environment discovery and memorization
- Train from human demonstration
- End-to-end manipulation | Images > Joint angles
- Recognize and pick up objects
With all these new capabilities, Tesla’s primary goal is to enable the Optimus to perform “increasingly complex tasks,” which may include sorting items into boxes. As we all know, it is potentially useful in a factory manufacturing line.
“I think the most notable difference is, if you look at the last time we showed Optimus and this video that was taken basically yesterday — the Optimus team was up all night making this video — the Optimus team has done an incredible job.”
Tesla CEO Elon Musk
In hindsight, CEO Musk claimed that the Tesla Bot could address the human labor crisis in an online interview with The Wall Street Journal in 2022. He further asserted then that these humanoid robots could boost the company’s automotive business.
CEO Musk reiterated that idea during the latest presentation.
“If you have a generalized humanoid robot, what would be the effective ratio of humanoid robots to humans? I think basically everyone would want one. And maybe people would want more than one, which means the actual demand for something like Optimus, if it really works — which it will — could be 10 billion units? It’s some crazy number.
It might be 20 billion units, if the ratio is two to one. It’s a very big number, a number that’s vastly inaccessible by the number of cars. So my prediction is that Tesla’s long-term value, the majority of long-term value, will be Optimus. And I am very confident in that prediction.”
Tesla CEO Elon Musk
See Also:
- Goldman Sachs: Tesla Bot-like humanoid robots could be a $150 billion-a-year business
- Tesla’s “Robot Dating” video may have teased a Tesla Cybertruck frame
- Tesla’s Optimus Bot project is on a hiring spree for different positions
- Tesla to use thousands of Humanoid Robots for its factories
- Elon Musk explains how Tesla values “investors” on Investor Day
It is also worth noting that Tesla previously suggested that production might start this year. However, engineers appear to be still ironing out the prototype’s bugs. Therefore, it might be some years before humanoids start working in Tesla factories.
