Latest / Elon Musk Podcast / Tesla’s Cybercab Prototype Spotted

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Tesla’s Cybercab Prototype Spotted · Elon Musk Podcast

• 0:01
  Hey everybody, welcome. Back to the Elon Musk Podcast.
• 0:05
  This is a show where we discuss the critical.
• 0:07
  Crossroads that shape. SpaceX, Tesla X, The Boring
• 0:11
  Company and Neurolink. I'm your host, Will Walden.
• 0:16
  Tesla's upcoming cyber cab just moved from concept to physical
• 0:20
  form, and the clues are sitting in plain sight at the company's
• 0:24
  Palo Alto headquarters. A newly spotted vehicle draped
• 0:27
  in a tight black cover appears to match the low profile shape
• 0:32
  of Tesla's driverless robotaxi prototype, which Elon Musk
• 0:36
  teased earlier this year. Has Tesla actually begun
• 0:40
  building the first functional cyber cabs now?
• 0:44
  The shape of the cover vehicle lines up with Musk's April
• 0:47
  reveal, where he briefly flashed a shadowed render of the Robo
• 0:51
  Taxi during the company's Robo Taxi Day announcement.
• 0:54
  And the design doesn't resemble any existing Tesla model.
• 0:57
  It's smaller and flatter than a Model 3, and it lacks the
• 1:01
  visible roof line of the Model Y Size, angle, and placement of
• 1:05
  the roof bump seen under the cover match the earlier concept
• 1:10
  image. A Tesla parked vehicle outside
• 1:12
  its 15 O one page Mill Rd. office, which is a location
• 1:17
  closely tied to its Autopilot and Full Self Driving teams.
• 1:21
  This isn't the kind of site where prototype hardware usually
• 1:23
  gets left unattainted, though. Tesla tends to keep early
• 1:27
  vehicles out of public view unless the goal is to send a
• 1:30
  message or to test public reaction.
• 1:33
  Parking this vehicle so openly right after Musk confirmed and
• 1:38
  August 8th unveiling for the Cyber Cab looks intentional.
• 1:42
  Now Tesla hasn't commented on the vehicle, but the location
• 1:45
  and timing both point toward this being a pre production
• 1:48
  prototype of the robotaxi. That matters because it means
• 1:52
  Tesla could already be testing cybercap hardware internally and
• 1:56
  up until now, that robotaxi was a promise which was hyped.
• 2:01
  It was announced, but nobody knew when they were actually
• 2:03
  going to start developing this thing or building this thing.
• 2:06
  It's the first real evidence of Tesla physically building
• 2:10
  something tied to this project. Now, the low profile and tight
• 2:14
  footprint of the prototype suggests that the Cyber Cab
• 2:16
  isn't based on a modified Model 3.
• 2:18
  Or why Tesla appears to be following through on his claim.
• 2:21
  The robotaxi will use an all new platform.
• 2:25
  That platform will reportedly be shared with Tesla's next
• 2:27
  generation compact vehicle, which is expected to be built at
• 2:32
  both Giga Texas and Giga Mexico. The $25,000 Tesla maybe, and
• 2:38
  we'll see now the cyber cab is designed as a driver of this
• 2:41
  vehicle from the start so Tesla can strip away components like
• 2:44
  the steering wheel and pedals and future iterations.
• 2:46
  That reduces interior complexity and cost, which Musk had
• 2:49
  previously said. We'll bring the right price
• 2:52
  below bus fare. But to reach that goal, Tesla
• 2:55
  still needs to prove that FSD, the full self driving system,
• 2:59
  can safely handle real world conditions without human
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  supervision. Musk said the robo taxi would
• 3:05
  look futuristic and the covered prototype supports that claim
• 3:09
  the short hood, high beltline and bubble like cabin match
• 3:12
  vehicle built primarily for autonomy, not driving in the
• 3:16
  shape of maximizes internal volume while minimizing surface
• 3:20
  area, which this is an efficient design choice for an urban
• 3:23
  transport pod of the timing of this sighting add some pressure.
• 3:27
  Tesla is set to unveil some more vehicles in the near future.
• 3:34
  They just released a $37,000 or basically a $40,000 model and a
• 3:40
  35,000 ish dollar model. And those were OK.
• 3:46
  They didn't really do much. Stock went down after the
• 3:49
  announcement, but it went back up the next day.
• 3:53
  You know, Tesla could be preparing to show a working
• 3:56
  vehicle with early hardware, which would signal that
• 3:59
  production is closer than presumably, you know, assumed by
• 4:03
  others out there. Now, this is competitive.
• 4:09
  Waymo and Cruise are the enemies here.
• 4:12
  Both companies have logged millions of miles with
• 4:14
  driverless cars, but the vehicles rely on modified
• 4:18
  passenger cars and rely heavily on Lidar and HD mapping.
• 4:22
  Tesla is betting on a pure vision based system, no lidar or
• 4:27
  radar, which requires stronger neural Nets and a more advanced
• 4:31
  AI model to match the safety level of the competitors.
• 4:34
  And if Tesla pulls this off, the company could skip the
• 4:38
  incremental rollout that other robotaxi firms rely on.
• 4:42
  Instead of geofence launches, Tesla could try for a more
• 4:45
  global release once regulators approve.
• 4:48
  Of course, that would reshape the right handling market.
• 4:52
  Bye bye Uber drivers. Bye bye Lyft drivers.
• 4:56
  You can have a robotaxi and pay, pay about the same amount of
• 5:00
  money and get a, a robot to do the driving for you.
• 5:05
  Let's get in, do your thing, get out.
• 5:07
  It's like Disney. Disney has something similar to
• 5:09
  this. You can have a basically a robo
• 5:12
  cab. They have set routes, but
• 5:15
  there's no driver and you can get in them and you can go
• 5:18
  someplace, you know, but this is real world, you know, this is
• 5:23
  Disney. They have pre approved routes,
• 5:24
  they have geofencing, they only go certain amount of speed and
• 5:28
  they know exactly what's going to be on the roadways.
• 5:31
  Now. This would reshape the whole
• 5:34
  ride hailing market and push legacy players to rethink their
• 5:38
  autonomous strategies. Somebody like Uber is going to
• 5:41
  be working with other companies, ride sharing companies out there
• 5:47
  who have vehicles. They're going to push all the
• 5:50
  drivers that are in driver positions right now.
• 5:54
  They're going to push them out of the business and they're
• 5:58
  going to have robo taxis, not the Elon and Tesla robotaxi, but
• 6:03
  they will have autonomous vehicles that will be driving
• 6:07
  people around. They're already doing it with
• 6:08
  Waymo. If you want a Waymo, get an
• 6:11
  Uber. You know, hop on an Uber and get
• 6:13
  it. But there goes the the economy
• 6:19
  for ride sharing for drivers. Look man, I'm going to be honest
• 6:22
  with you. In the hard times, I drive Uber
• 6:25
  or I drove Uber in the hard times and it pays OK.
• 6:31
  If you drive all day, you can make decent amount of money, but
• 6:34
  you got to drive sometimes 12 hours stay in order to make a
• 6:38
  good amount of money. And even then you got to really
• 6:42
  rely on tips from people. And some people are just cheap.
• 6:45
  So you never know how much money you're going to make that day,
• 6:48
  but you can bring in, you know, if you do it right, couple $1000
• 6:53
  a week and that alone is enough money for rent, child care,
• 7:02
  whatever, if you need the money. But that's all going away.
• 7:05
  I don't think it's going to go away right away though.
• 7:07
  This stuff takes time, right? Cyber cab isn't going to just
• 7:10
  hit the ground running and regulators are going to take
• 7:13
  their sweet time because what happens if there's an accident?
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  Who's liable? What happens?
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  One of these things gets pulled over by a police officer.
• 7:24
  What happens then? Does the person just kind of
• 7:27
  like get out and who do you ticket for these kind of things
• 7:31
  like say what if these one of these robotaxi or cyber cabs
• 7:36
  goes down one way Rd. the wrong way, a cop pulls up behind him,
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  pulls him over and there's no driver.
• 7:44
  So who do you ticket? You must ticket Tesla.
• 7:47
  There's got to be so there's got to be regulations around this.
• 7:51
  And before they actually roll these things out.
• 7:53
  So it's going to be a while. People these, you know,
• 7:56
  rideshare apps are still going to be around for a while.
• 8:00
  Taxis are going to be around for a while.
• 8:02
  Limousines are going to be around for a while.
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  People dislike people, you know, they, they want people around
• 8:06
  sometimes. Sometimes you don't.
• 8:07
  And that's when you hail a driverless cab like a cyber cab.
• 8:13
  But the presence of this prototype is pretty big and Elon
• 8:19
  and Tesla are very secretive about their hardware.
• 8:23
  So having this outside where people can see Rick see it clear
• 8:27
  as day is not just a render anymore.
• 8:30
  It's a real thing. They're they appear to be
• 8:35
  building the hardware, need to support the robotaxi, the cyber
• 8:39
  cab, All that stuff is going to be happening very soon.
• 8:44
  So if you're in one of those areas like Austin, grab 1, you
• 8:49
  know, grab a, grab a Tesla, an automated Tesla and scoot
• 8:53
  around, see what it feels like and, you know, get to your
• 8:57
  destination. But you don't even need to talk
• 8:59
  to somebody. You can pick your own music too,
• 9:01
  which is great. All right, so that's about it
• 9:04
  for today's episode, everybody. But I want to ask you a
• 9:06
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• 12:07
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