Tesla‘s Robotaxi autonomous taxi service is currently serving only one, penis-shaped area of Austin, but the company’s ambitions are much, much bigger than that.
Speaking during the company’s earnings call on Wednesday, CEO Elon Musk said he thinks the company will “have Robotaxi in half the population of the US by the end of the year,” while noting that this is subject to regulatory approvals.
“We’re getting the regulatory permission to launch in the Bay Area, Nevada, Arizona, Florida, and a number of other places,” said Musk.
Mashable Light Speed
During the call, Musk did also say that the company is being “very cautious” with Robotaxi expansion, but that the service areas and the number of vehicles in operation will increase at a “hyper-exponential rate.”
Musk previously said the Robotaxi service would expand to the Bay Area in a “month or two”, but this new plan is ambitious, even for Musk’s own (often unrealistic) standards. Tesla is currently offering its Robotaxi service in a reported 10-20 Model Y vehicles (the number might have increased since launch), and only to a limited number of participants.
Alphabet’s Waymo is currently available in several major U.S. cities, including Austin, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Atlanta. The company also plans to launch its self-driving service in Miami and Washington D.C. in 2026.
Tesla does have a big advantage over other self-driving taxi services — it uses stock Model Y cars as its Robotaxis, while Waymo, Zoox and other competitors use highly modified cars with added sensors such as cameras, radars, and lidars. This means that Tesla could technically expand a lot faster than its competitors, though none of it will happen until regulators give it the green light.
