Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, plans widespread deployment of self

Automated translation by Reuters using machine learning and AI, please refer to the following disclaimer: https://bit.ly/rtrsauto.
Commentary by Steven Scheer

Tesla CEO Elon Musk stated on Monday that he expects fully autonomous cars, without a human safety driver, to become widespread in the United States by the end of the year, after being introduced in Texas.

Speaking via video conference at the Smart Mobility Summit in Tel Aviv, Mr. Musk mentioned that autonomous cars were already driving in Texas without a safety monitor and that this system would expand nationwide this year.

Tesla, which has experienced a slowdown in vehicle sales, operates robotaxis in Austin, Dallas, and Houston. However, Reuters journalists who tested them reported long wait times and sometimes complete unavailability, with some drop-off points far from the passenger’s destination.

Last November, Tesla obtained authorization to operate a ride-hailing service in Arizona.

Despite making bold predictions about autonomous vehicles for over a decade, many of which did not materialize as quickly as he had anticipated, Musk remains optimistic that driverless cars will be prevalent within a decade.

Musk stated, “Within five years and certainly within ten years… probably 90% of all travel will be by AI in autonomous vehicles. So, in ten years, driving your own car will become an extremely marginalized practice.”

Currently, Tesla is recalling 218,868 vehicles in the U.S. due to a delay in the display of the rearview camera images, which could increase the risk of accidents, as reported by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) earlier this month.

Waymo, a subsidiary of Alphabet, recalled approximately 3,800 robotaxis in the U.S. last week after identifying a risk that vehicles could enter flooded roads with higher speed limits, raising safety concerns.

During the summit, Musk also mentioned that his rocket and satellite manufacturing company, SpaceX, is on the verge of developing reusable rocket launch systems, a development that would reduce the cost of space travel.

“We could achieve this by the end of this year,” he said. “When this technology is developed, it will be a turning point in human history, allowing us to become a space-faring civilization.”

Musk also announced that later this year, his brain implant company Neuralink would perform its first implant with the Blindsight device to help blind or visually impaired individuals see.

“This will initially give them limited vision, but I believe over time, they will benefit from very precise vision, maybe even superhuman vision,” he said, adding that the company is also working on developing technology to help paralyzed individuals walk again.

Musk believes that within a decade, humanoid robots will be “virtually everywhere” and, as robots are productive, this will likely stimulate economic growth with “high incomes for everybody.”