The Tesla Cybercab has entered production, so why is Musk hitting the brakes?

The Tesla Cybercab is now being produced at the company’s Gigafactory in Austin, Texas, but Elon Musk seems unusually cautious about the rollout.

The start of production of the robots was announced Thursday on The company did A few initial e-taxis in FebruaryBut continued production only started this month.

But with the company’s robotics plans creeping along much slower than expected, many Tesla watchers have been left scratching their heads about the future — especially as Musk reins in his bombastic tone.

On this week’s earnings callMusk seemed uncharacteristically pessimistic about Tesla’s robotaxi expansion plans. He did not provide any new details about the company’s recent expansion into Dallas and Houston. (Each city only has two vehicles a week after launch.)

“The limiting factor for expansion is really strict verification, making sure things are completely secure,” he said in response to questions about the slower-than-expected rollout. “We don’t want to have a single accidental injury with the Robotaxi expansion, and to our credit we haven’t had one so far.”

But we don’t know if this is entirely true. Tesla has reported 14 crashes involving its robotic vehicle to the federal government since the service launched in Austin, Texas, a year ago. Unlike other robotaxi operators that provide details about the nature of each crash and any injuries sustained, Tesla routinely redacts that information.

However, it was strange to hear Musk sound so pessimistic about Tesla’s robotaxi trial. In the past, the billionaire CEO could barely contain himself when talking about the company’s self-driving future, constantly promising that full unsupervised self-driving, in which the driver would be able to let the car drive for him without any interference, was just around the corner.

Its proponents point to the success of Autopilot, and then FSD (supervision), as evidence of this While his promises may not be completely in line with realityIt continues to be at the forefront of societal transformation from human-powered vehicles to vehicles driven by artificial intelligence. He even raises an army of working robots to prove that technology is officially agnostic.

But there have been hundreds of crashes involving Teslas using FSD and Autopilot, and dozens of deaths. With many government agencies Investigate the company’s allegations About autonomous driving, FSD appears to be in play The cusp of a major recall. So, after learning all this, Musk may have decided to rein in his over-promising and appear more realistic about what’s to come. He admitted that Cybercab production will be slow until the end of the year.

“When you have a new product with a completely new supply chain, and everything is new, it’s always an extended S-curve, so you should expect that the initial production of Cybercab and Semi will be very slow, but then it ramps up and ramps up dramatically at the end of the year and certainly next year,” he said. “In fact, we will ramp up production of all vehicles, in all plants, to the best of our ability during the remainder of this year.”

Last year, Musk said that by the end of 2025, 50% of the US population would have access to Tesla Robotaxi service, calling the expansion “hyperexponential.” But as of today, The company operates in only a few citiesincluding Austin, Dallas, and Houston. The company also operates a human-driven transportation service in San Francisco, where access is “by invitation only.”

Another problem with the Cybercab is the lack of traditional controls, such as a steering wheel, pedals, mirrors and other features required by federal motor vehicle safety standards. The government provides exemptions to companies that wish to produce vehicles that do not contain these features, but limits the number of vehicles to 2,500 per company. Legislation to lift the cap and allow more purpose-built self-driving vehicles to be built has been stalled in Congress for years.

But when asked on X if Tesla Cybercab production would be subject to the cap, Vice President of Vehicle Engineering Lars Murvay answered “no.” The company appears to be self-certifying that its vehicles comply with current safety standards, similar to how Amazon’s Zoox has addressed the issue with its purpose-built autonomous shuttles. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, under President Biden, It launched an investigation into Zoox’s self-certification claimbut This investigation has been closed After President Trump took office.

Tesla’s Cybercab is designed to operate without any human intervention – after all, there is no steering wheel or pedals for a human to use. But Tesla has not yet resolved the issue of full autonomy. Musk continues to push the deadline for unsupervised FSD, especially for customer vehicles that the company no longer owns. When asked to predict the onset of unsupervised driving, Musk consistently provided timelines that were later proven wrong.

On the earnings call, Musk wavered between caution and overpromising. FSD version 15, a “comprehensive overhaul of the software architecture,” will come by the end of this year or early next year, he said. But he also acknowledged that millions of Tesla vehicles equipped with Computer 3, sold between 2019 and 2023, You will not be able to achieve uncontrolled driving without serious retrofits – Inconsistency with previous commitments.

“I think unsupervised FSD or Robotaxi revenue won’t be as significant this year, but I think it will likely be material in a significant way next year,” Musk added.