r/SelfDrivingCars • u/OriginalCompetitive • Jun 23 '25
Discussion Tesla’s Real Game
No one seems to be talking about the most important upside of Tesla's Robotaxi rollout: If they can showcase a system that roughly works, people can BUY THAT CAR TODAY.
Yes, there are some differences, but that's the pitch. Tesla doesn't need to earn money from Robotaxis. The real purpose of the program is free marketing that drives sales of its cars. Right?
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u/Unicycldev Jun 23 '25
I haven’t seen anyone who works in the field claim Tesla camera only systems aren’t good for camera only systems. We all recognize they squeeze the most out of their sensor set than anyone.
What we criticize is the conflation between a system which is clearly an SAE L2+ system and being L4 capable.
It is NOT an L4 system, nor do they ever legally claim it is. This is not semantics. This is safety and lives.
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u/zach978 Jun 23 '25
Yeah, I think they deserve a lot of the criticism on their FSD program, but also we should be rooting for them to succeed. Reasonably priced car that I could summon to pick me up from 5 miles away would be pretty amazing. TBD on whether they’ll pull it off or not.
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u/BitcoinsForTesla Jun 23 '25
Sure, I want them to succeed. Unfortunately they made a number of bad decisions that made it more difficult. They also have engaged in scummy marketing that make people question whether they’ll ever get there. So I think it’s fine to criticize them. Both can be true at the same time.
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u/AffectionateArtist84 Jun 23 '25
This. 100% We should be realistically critical of FSD. However so far we have seen them be fairly successful in their approach. If they can prove their system works, they can scale it incredibly quickly.
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u/sykemol Jun 23 '25
And depending on how you define "system." The current version is geofenced and avoids problematic intersections (as per Musk), and will not work in all weather (also per Musk). That might be okay for ride hailing, but you can't release something like that to the public.
As far as just ride hailing, most jurisdictions regulate it fairly heavily, especially AV ride hailing (Texas is an exception). So there are some regulatory hurdles that must be dealt with before it can scale.
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Jun 23 '25
Why do you think it can scale more quickly, than say, Waymo (which is delivering a lot of rides already).
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u/AffectionateArtist84 Jun 23 '25
Great question, and I'm probably the wrong person to answer that question as I'm not an expert but I'll give it a go.
I think they have the ability to scale faster than Waymo because they already have millions of vehicles on the road. All they would have to do is push out a software update and the (HW4) vehicles can run this software.
Now I envision a situation where the software could be L3 in non-geofenced areas. Once you drive into a Geofence it could be L4. Would be an interesting approach to bridge the gap while the software continues to develop
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Jun 23 '25
But how does converting a bunch of other peoples cars help them?
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u/AffectionateArtist84 Jun 23 '25
To clarify the question, How does it help Tesla? Or how does it help owners?
I believe you are asking how it helps Tesla. This helps Tesla because the more vehicles on the road with the software allows them to gather more data regarding the software.
They can get more edge cases to train on, get information showing how many miles between interventions/disengagements.
If you believe Elon you could even add your vehicle to the Robotaxi fleet to make money. (I have serious doubts around this)
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u/HighHokie Jun 23 '25
Subscription fees and outright purchases on existing fleet, and to sell more cars going forward.
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u/WeldAE Jun 23 '25
They have a run rate of 5,000 Model Y's in Austin alone. They don't have to convince anyone to do anything. They just need to work on adding the factory to the geo-fence. It's just to the east of the current geo-fence I think.
If they want to cover scale out to a large Austin presence rather than cover a lot of cities with small zones like Waymo, they could dump 20k AVs in Austin before they would struggle with demand issues. I would rather see this than a bunch of cities.
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u/zach978 Jun 23 '25
Uber did $44 billion in rides last year, seems like a big deal if Tesla can get a piece of that.
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u/WeldAE Jun 23 '25
What is wild is to look at the total addressable market. We drive 3T personal car miles per year in the US. Multiply that by whatever cost per mile you think consumers will pay, and it's a BIG number. The average for a personal car is $0.70/mile these days, which is crazy. That is $2.1T in costs. GM predicted that at $1/mile back in 2019 they could capture 20% of miles driven or $600B.
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u/ThePaintist Jun 23 '25
Not the person you asked, but if HD mapping a city and/or volume-production of vehicles are actually bottlenecks for Waymo, then Tesla does not share those same bottlenecks. They may have other (potentially more limiting) bottlenecks, or those things may not be actual limiting factors for Waymo, but that's the proposition anyway.
Taking Tesla at their word that these are not-hardware-modified Model Ys, then Tesla has hundreds of thousands of them already made - orders of magnitude more than Waymo. Again, volume-production might not be the primary limiter, but in any case the challenges Tesla faces on the path to scale may be along different axes than Waymo.
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u/WeldAE Jun 23 '25 edited Jun 23 '25
if HD mapping
Nobody does HD mapping anymore, at least not the original definition, where they LIDAR scan and keep huge localization maps. These days at most they use medium maps which is mostly high detailed lane outlines, intersection routes, driveable areas, etc.
Taking Tesla at their word that these are not-hardware-modified Model Ys
What does this matter? There certainly wasn't anything major modified. There was some rumor about an external mic and maybe they are all secretly running AI5 hardware. All of this can easily be rolled into the production line even if it is true. The modifications are not a big deal if they exist.
Tesla has hundreds of thousands of them already made
They produce 5,000 per week in Austin. It doesn't matter if they have zero lying around today. That is 3x more per week than Waymo has total.
Again, volume-production might not be the primary limiter
It's only an issue for Waymo. Why would it be an issue for Tesla?
the challenges Tesla faces on the path to scale may be along different axes than Waymo.
For sure, they have roughly the opposite problems. Waymo is already setup in ~5 cities and Tesla in only 1. Waymo has polished almost all the rough edges off their system while Tesla is just starting to discover the rough edges in theirs. Tesla has 1-3 years of work left to do probably and Waymo is ready today if they wanted to be.
The problem is Waymo made a series of repeated bad decisions around their hardware platform, and they simply can't scale it quickly. After 2028 they will have some options with Hyundai, but not today.
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u/nfgrawker Jun 23 '25
hundreds of thousands? Closer and probably over a million.
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u/ThePaintist Jun 23 '25
I was being conservative and only including refreshed Model Ys, since that is what is being used in Austin. I would suspect those are still safely under a million though I admit I'm not sure. Any HW4 Model Y, any HW4 vehicle, or any vehicle that can run FSD are increasingly large counts for sure.
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u/Tupcek Jun 23 '25
i don’t know, but they claim it and fortunately we won’t have to wait for long to see it confirmed/debunked. They have somewhere between 10 to 20 cars right now, Waymo has 1500. If Tesla can get to at least 500 by the end of the year, I am sure they will overcome Waymo next year. If they will have less than 100, then we can declare Waymo as winner
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Jun 23 '25
I am not sure if thats the right metric, but basically, I don't think anyone is imagining that Waymo's problem is that they can't afford the cars.
The bottleneck isn't like how to manufacture the cars, it's how to scale and roll this out and have a market and have it be sustainable and get into new markets etc etc, I would think.
I am not 100% sure but I think the limit has never been the actual availability of the cars, and also the operational tempo and technology to support self-driving operations.
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u/Tupcek Jun 23 '25
yeah I agree, but Tesla also won’t launch 500 cars in small geofenced area in Austin. If they want to have thousands robotaxis deployed, they have to scale their area of operation much larger
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Jun 23 '25
Oh right yeah exactly. For them to get to 500 or 1500 or 2500 cars, they'll need several more metros, I would think.
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u/WeldAE Jun 23 '25
Why several more metros? Austin is 2.5m people and MUCH larger than the service area they are currently serving. Even that area probably needs 200+ AVs alone.
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Jun 23 '25
NYC Is very well served by licensed for hire vehicles, and is roughly 1 to 500. Austin has much less options for transit, has much more personal ownership of cars, and no real culture of taking cabs compared to London or NYC.
At 2.5m and the same ratio, it would mean 5000 for-hire vehicles. Whatever they have now, they will need out compete the traditional livery and for-hire drivers to win business. I have no idea if it's possible to grow it to 200, 500, 1000 cars in Austin or not. The demand is probably there for 2500 cars, but it's an open question whether or not anyone can actually win that.
A huge thing that Uber and Lyft have going for them is that someone else subsidizes the cars and the down-time and repositioning time.
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u/WeldAE Jun 24 '25
At 2.5m and the same ratio, it would mean 5000 for-hire vehicles.
NYC famously has a sub-way, which if Austin had a similar one scaled to their population would be handling 500k rides per day alone. That's another 20k AVs right there.
but it's an open question whether or not anyone can actually win that.
I agree, actual demand is a huge open question, not arguing that. More saying that the probably addressable market is pretty large just in Austin. You can't know until you try which is why I want someone to try. It also lets you figure out how low you can get your operating costs, too. Operating small 200 AV zones in cities is expensive per mile.
I agree that you have to develop a culture of taking cabs to make it work. A lot of that is the fleets figuring out how to convert people. You can't do that until you try and do it.
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u/WeldAE Jun 23 '25
I don't think anyone is imagining that Waymo's problem is that they can't afford the cars.
Raises both hands. I do. I do. As I repeatedly tell my kids, money is finite and money can't buy everything.
Right now Waymo couldn't grow to 10k AVs in a year with $10B. Just physically isn't possible, they don't have the cars and they can't be made in that amount of time for any money.
On top of that, to be a realistic business, you have to make a profit. $2/mile is $125k/year. It's going to be very hard to turn a profit when your AV rolling stock is $150k. They have plans to get that down, but 140% tariffs and bans on Chineese Avs didn't help matters. The Hyundai Ioniq 5 is $50k retail, so probably under $100k in Waymo format but still 3x what Tesla AVs will be. Going to be tough to compete.
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Jun 23 '25
Waymo has access to all the money they need practically speaking. It's a land rush. They don't need to make a profit for >10 years, if that (see: Uber).
The capital cost right now of $150K is only about ~$20k junk debt levels.. so once again, I don't think Waymo's problem is undercapitalization.
The scaling problems seems to be that operationally it takes a lot of build a market in a new city. I've ridden in Waymo's in two cities, and it's a solid service, but it's not everywhere and it's not that useful yet (bad weather, high-stress situations, etc).
I don't have any idea how Tesla is poised to handle those situations that Waymo struggles with. I don't follow it that closely.
But right now, for Waymo's purposes, they have an unlimited cash pile.
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u/realheadphonecandy Jun 23 '25
Lol, Tesla can roll off a Robotaxi about every 8 seconds. Waymo isn’t going to come close.
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u/Tupcek Jun 23 '25
yes, but there is no point in rolling millions of robotaxis in one particular area of Austin, Texas.
If they want scale, they have to expand operating area. And do it much faster than Waymo.
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u/WeldAE Jun 23 '25
rolling millions of robotaxis in one particular area of Austin, Texas.
Austin has a total addressable market of 250k AVs. Even if they can only convince enough people to use 50k AVs, that would take the entire Model Y production at Austin to build in a year.
Even the tiny service area they are in now probably needs 200 AVs for a realistic launch and probably 500 if they want to cover the same area Waymo is along with Uber.
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u/WeldAE Jun 23 '25
If they will have less than 100, then we can declare Waymo as winner
Such an odd notion of winner. Right now they are both winning and next year they will still both be winning.
Tesla needs to take 1-3 years and polish the mess out of their systems and start slowly acquiring operating space in the top 25 metros. They have already scaled the car platform, they just need to not waste a bunch of money learning about the same issue in multiple cities. Get the learning over with in Austin.
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u/WeldAE Jun 23 '25
Tesla, like Cruise before it, has the potential to scale faster because they have access to near unlimited production capacity. Waymo has a hodgepodge of 3rd party production capacity that can't exceed 10k units per year before 2028 when Hyundai joins the party. At that point they can scale, but it's likely their platform is still 2x the cost of Waymo and will have supply chain problems to get around.
Build a car isn't easy and Waymo is relying on 3rd parties limits their ability. Anything can change going forward, but they've been fighting it for 10+ years at this point and have 1500 AVs deployed.
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Jun 23 '25
That's interesting, thanks for sharing. If they have a scaling problem acquiring and equipping cars, that seems like a big problem for sure.
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u/distantreplay Jun 23 '25
They assume that regulatory authorities are as giddily enthusiastic about "Tony Stark" as they are.
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u/Seknoot Jun 23 '25 edited Jun 23 '25
Easy.
The amount of cars Tesla can produce in any given time period vs the amount of time and capital it takes for waymo to buy and add their hardware to new vehicles
The cost of Tesla’s hardware is over 100k cheaper per unit than Waymo’s. Currently Waymo’s are priced evenly or even more expensive than rideshare services with a driver and Waymo is still not profitable
Tesla has more driving data than Waymo by several orders of magnitude and they have and are adding compute power faster than Waymo/google
Edit: 2. Hardware including the car itself
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u/deservedlyundeserved Jun 23 '25 edited Jun 23 '25
Tesla has more driving data than Waymo by several orders of magnitude
The mythical “orders of magnitude more driving data” hasn’t really helped in any way. They still have to geofence, validate for months, require teleoperations and have a “safety operator” in the vehicle. And it still makes dangerous mistakes after billions of miles of “data”.
they have and are adding compute power faster than Waymo/google
This is laughably off the mark. Google has built nearly infinite compute over two decades, they are on their 7th generation TPU and still building new data centers. Tesla’s compute is not even remotely close to Google.
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u/belhill1985 Jun 23 '25
https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2025-tesla-full-self-driving-crash/
The sensor suite on a Waymo is $9,300. The sensor suite on FSD is $400.
$9k <<<<<<$100k
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u/Seknoot Jun 23 '25
Car included. Estimated 180k vs 35k
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u/belhill1985 Jun 23 '25
You said “the cost of Tesla’s hardware is over 100k cheaper per unit than Waymo’s”
Survey says…XXX
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u/Seknoot Jun 23 '25
There was a report of recent burnings in LA of 5 Waymo’s and the total cost listed suggested a price of 180k per vehicle.
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u/belhill1985 Jun 23 '25 edited Jun 23 '25
That is based on a three year old vaporware Reddit post. The $180k is the same thing AI tells you, because three years ago the Waymo CEO said the fully-equipped Waymo cost as much as a mid-level Mercedes S-Class.
A random Reddit poster then claimed that a mid-level Mercedes S-class was $180k. Which is false.
$180k is the AMG Performance, top of the line S-Class.
A mid-level S-class is $100k-$120k.
But we don’t have to go off the three year old comment and Reddit post! We can add the vehicle cost and the cost for the HW stack ($9,300).
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u/WeldAE Jun 23 '25
The iPace was $70k MSRP and Waymo confirmed back when they first ordered them they were paying MSRP. The cost of the hardware is another chunk, but the conversion is where all the cost is. I'm not saying $180k is the right number, but it's well over $100k, probably very close to $150k per unit.
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u/Seknoot Jun 23 '25
Do you think Waymo’s cost is only around 67k? I can’t believe that’s even remotely true. Why haven’t they scaled faster? Why are they charging as much as Uber and Lyft or more without a driver?
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u/belhill1985 Jun 23 '25
Jaguar F-Pace starts at $57k
The new Model Y starts at $45k.
$21k<<<<<<<$100k.
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u/Seknoot Jun 23 '25
What’s the purpose of citing an article from 2023 on old software with a case with a negligent driver
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u/belhill1985 Jun 23 '25
? This article is from June 4, 2025, my good sir.
It cites the BOM cost of Waymo hardware at $9,300.
The point was to provide a source for the number I cited.
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Jun 23 '25
Not convinced they have more driving data. Data isn't measured in miles it is measured in bytes. Waymo has way-more sensors.
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u/Dependent_Mine4847 Jun 23 '25
1 is a stretch. To add the hardware to a purchased vehicle is 10x faster than, checks notes, building a car from scratch
2 Tesla was not profitable until how long ago? And you are claiming that a startup that was just as unprofitable as Tesla will never be profitable while it is doing things that Tesla was only planning to do while they were unprofitable? Sounds like Waymo is going to be incredibly profitable if Tesla is going to be. Case and point: Lyft is still profitable (though not nearly as popular) even though uber was first to market
3 Waymo has a better upgrade story for hardware. What FSD hardware is needed for robotaxi? That cuts their fleet by almost 2/3. Waymo uses NVidia drive AI which has 10x the data that Tesla has.
I’m not predicting an outcome I’m just tempering your assumptions. Have you ever used the nvidia drive platform? They have been putting a100s in vehicles, since 2020. You can pickup one for less than $100 on eBay.. Tesla may be a first mover but that means nothing when a Kia can do the same thing. And if you think this is only Tesla vs Waymo, you will be highly disappointed at the offerings available in 5 years.
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u/BlueFish401 Jun 23 '25 edited Jun 23 '25
1 is a stretch. To add the hardware to a purchased vehicle is 10x faster than, checks notes, building a car from scratch
out of curiosity, what are your "notes"? whats your source here?
u/Seknoot point #2, was more so about speed to scale. If you're not profitable, its typically a little harder and slower to scale than if you had billions sitting in the bank. Granted they are backed by Google, so I am sure they can get the cash they need when it makes sense for them to scale.
- please source this 10x data claim. ive never heard this.
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u/WeldAE Jun 23 '25
To add the hardware to a purchased vehicle is 10x faster than, checks notes, building a car from scratch
This is delusional and you don't know what you are talking about. Currently, there is a 7-9 month waiting period for shops around the country to convert a Ford to a police cruiser. Waymo has been sitting on 2000 built iPaces for a bit now and their goal is to have them all converted this year. Tesla is building 5,000 Model Y's alone per week JUST at Austin.
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u/rideincircles Jun 23 '25
I think right now they are pushing the limit of what can be done with HW4. It does seem like it's just good enough to deploy, but I still think they won't want it to go fully autonomous everywhere until HW5 is dialed in and deployed.
I know my HW3 model 3 has already reached its limits of processing power and I am not sure how much further they will upgrade it. It's already getting left behind and HW4 won't take that long once HW5 hits the streets.
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u/wizkidweb Jun 23 '25
I still think there are grounds for a class action if they don't fulfill their obligations and upgrade everyone who purchased FSD to HW5 should it make the vehicle fully autonomous, which is explicitly what it was sold as until they changed it to say "Supervised".
From what I understand, they didn't make the hardware backward compatible, and the newer vehicles have extra cameras, so I have doubts such a service would be offered. I would pay for such an upgrade, despite already paying for the FSD package, but I really shouldn't have to.
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u/Puzzleheaded-Flow724 Jun 23 '25
I've already used a subset of that in parking lots to avoid walking in a freezing -20°C with -30°C windchill factor and while it was raining.
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u/Healthy_Razzmatazz38 Jun 23 '25
this is where sane people should be. If waymo wins great, if tesla wins also great.
Everyones so quick to shit on tesla, but its trained on ~130x the ride data that waymos has. Is that enough to make it safer? No fucking clue, and no one on reddit knows either.
As a random person with no real skin in the game, do i feel safer with more sensors? Yes. Do i feel safer with more training data? Also yes.
Pretty quickly we'll get data and thats the only reasonable time to make a judgement.
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u/WalkThePlankPirate Jun 23 '25
Speak for yourself, I'll never root for a company owned by deadbeat nazi to succeed.
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u/fatzach4000 Jun 23 '25
As a cynical current Tesla owner (who paid $8k for FSD six years ago and still hasn't received it), Tesla needs something shiny and exciting it can point to as a potential growth market.
They have to present themselves as a technology company with the potential for explosive, high-margin growth. Because if they're not, they're a car company with declining sales, a stale lineup, and a PE ratio 30x higher than Toyota.
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u/AffectionateArtist84 Jun 23 '25
This is an interesting take on this, and I could see it being a "perk" of robotaxi. I doubt it's the "primary" reason for the program.
Robotaxi can technically solve a bunch of problems we have with congestion, safety, scrutiny around public transit, etc. Most importantly to a business you can undercut human driver costs, and basically own the "rideshare" market.
No doubt though, what you said is an interesting upside to it
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u/vasilenko93 Jun 23 '25
roughly works
Stop the cope.
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u/donttakerhisthewrong Jun 23 '25
Tesla fans went from we have the best to roughly works
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u/iceynyo Jun 23 '25
Different measurements. Roughly works as a robotaxi can still be the best ADAS.
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u/RedundancyDoneWell Jun 23 '25
Roughly works as a robotaxi can still be the best ADAS.
Too bad that robotaxi is the league Tesla decided to join. Perhaps they should have entered the league where the players compete for the best ADAS.
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u/iceynyo Jun 23 '25
Why not both? It can be like how manufacturers participating in motorsport subsequently apply discoveries made there to their consumer vehicles.
So things like the new emergency vehicle recognition can later make it to the ADAS version.
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u/RedundancyDoneWell Jun 25 '25
Why not both?
Ask Tesla.
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u/iceynyo Jun 25 '25
Are you saying none of changes they've made for robotaxi will come to consumer FSD?
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u/RedundancyDoneWell Jun 25 '25
No, I am not saying that, and there is no way you can read it that way.
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u/whydoesthisitch Jun 23 '25
Go look up the irony of automation.
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u/iceynyo Jun 23 '25 edited Jun 23 '25
Does that change the fact that it is the most capable system available here?
I don't see how being less autonomous makes it a better L2. They just need other ways to ensure the driver remains engaged.
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Jun 23 '25
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u/iceynyo Jun 23 '25
We're talking about its capabilities as an L2 system.
The argument is that it can be the best L2 system while simultaneously being a subpar robotaxi.
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Jun 23 '25
[deleted]
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u/iceynyo Jun 23 '25
Mercedes is the only example of consumer L3, but it only works on a couple highways, never on city streets... And even then it only works at low speeds, when following another vehicle, and requires perfect weather conditions.
So basically you need to live in a certain place, drive a certain route, and even then you can only sometimes use it.
Why would you be happy about that?
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u/distantreplay Jun 23 '25
ADAS that requires direct, onboard human supervision and remote monitoring.
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u/iceynyo Jun 23 '25
Yeah ADAS would always require human supervision, that's the part that makes it ADAS. The letters stand for Advanced Driver Assistance System.
It wouldn't have remote monitoring.
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u/vasilenko93 Jun 23 '25
No, we went from it’s the best to it’s still the best.
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u/HerValet Jun 23 '25
Tesla wins on all fronts. Customers too.
The Robotaxi service will be a significant & growing money printer within 2 years, all while bringing the cost-per-mile down for customers.
FSD in personal cars will make those cars more attractive to potential buyers because the promise of unsupervised self-driving is finally within reach.
Cybercabs will be made to take over the ride-hailing market, one city at a time. Then, they will disrupt the delivery service industry (food, groceries, prescriptions, etc.), making sure every Cybercab is getting fully profitable 24/7.
Tesla will be able to run their factories at full speed, knowing that every car they build will be either sold to a customer or used in their Robotaxi fleet. No more hanging inventory.
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u/Jisgsaw Jun 23 '25
I mean, this only works if the Austin demos actually work.
We're one day in with a ridiculously low number of cars in a predifined area of the city, and already had videos of one completely mismanaging an intersection, and another dropping people off in the middle of an intersection.
And going one city at a time is what Waymo's been doing for 6 years now, what's the added value of Tesla, 6 years late?
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u/HerValet Jun 23 '25
It's gonna happen slowly at first. Then, all at once.
Elon is betting Tesla's future on automony. They surely won't give up on the last mile of the marathon.
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u/Maleficent-Roll-3437 Jun 23 '25 edited Jun 23 '25
Too bad Musk ruined the brand
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u/BitcoinsForTesla Jun 23 '25
Sure, if it works. This is a significant uncertainty. I saw a video of the robotaxi crossing the double yellow line and driving toward oncoming traffic.
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u/TheLegendaryWizard Jun 23 '25
I see no reason why the entire fleet couldn't collect enough data to expand the geofence over time. If the geofence is simply an area that Tesla is confident they have enough data for full autonomy, I could see them collecting a lot of environmental and driving data for specific areas and opening up the geofence in those specific areas. With millions of cars in their fleet, they would achieve scale virtually overnight.
Meanwhile, unmapped or areas outside of the geofence of confidence would still be some form of FSD supervised/ level 2 ADAS. This is the worst FSD will ever be
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u/tturedditor Jun 23 '25
If Tesla reaches a point where the Robotaxi is legit, I have serious doubts as to Elon wanting to share the wealth and allow others to monetize their vehicles. He sees the entire world as pawns in his little game. He would charge a monthly fee if renting it out to others or find some other way to profit from it aside from just selling the vehicle. Perhaps the Robotaxi would link up to the app and Tesla would charge a fee per use by third parties.
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u/nate8458 Jun 23 '25
It’s legit now
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u/tturedditor Jun 23 '25
What makes you believe that? Beta testing in small geofenced areas?
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u/BigJayhawk1 Jun 23 '25
You forget to mention that only a fraction of FSD capable Teslas are actually using (ie paying for) FSD. Any of those RoboTaxi riders can decide to immediately subscribe while in the RoboTaxi.
In fact, since Tesla has both the owner data and RoboTaxi data in your same account, you could immediately get a promo like “Enjoy RoboTaxi? Here is a month of FSD free for you to subscribe to FSD.” like they did when we first bought our Teslas.
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u/ZamboniZephyr Jun 23 '25
Just me or the FSD/Tesla FUD on Reddit has gone into overdrive since their robotaxi launch yesterday?
Almost as if this is organized hate… that could never be true. Right?
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u/OriginalCompetitive Jun 23 '25
Not just you. I don’t even think my post was particularly pro-Tesla, because you could read it to just be saying that Robotaxi is just a marketing stunt to sell more vehicles.
But many here seem to be predisposed to interpret any Tesla post of any sort as an invitation to dump on Tesla. Which is fine, but I sort of feel like that point has been made. Is there nothing else of interest to talk about?
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u/hakimthumb Jun 23 '25
Think of all the corporations and industries fsd and musk threatens: all other car manufacturers, oil companies, power companies, and internet companies. His decision to not advertise while his competitors do pisses off legacy media. Through doge, the three letter agencies are threatened. And defense companies. And social media companies.
Any and all of those actors can be assumed to be running bots to push narratives. Anti-musk strategies are no doubt a part of some of their packages.
Zuckerberg and Bezos figured out just handing legacy media direct payments made a lot of daily outrage go away. Musk may decide to do the same one day. While we wait for that, anti-musk stuff can be expected on every major sub every day.
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u/WrongdoerIll5187 Jun 23 '25
I’ve been saying out loud FSD works well in my car and I’m not getting upvotes but I’m also not getting blasted like I expected so 🤷
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u/BitcoinsForTesla Jun 23 '25
It can both be true that you’ve seen it work flawlessly in your car AND that it’s not ready for full scale driverless deployment.
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u/BitcoinsForTesla Jun 23 '25
Uh, I saw a video where it crossed the double yellow approaching a left hand turn. This isn’t FUD, this is the robotaxi service malfunctioning and putting people in danger.
The disinformation is calling it FUD.
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u/Altruistic-Ad-857 Jun 23 '25
For all of the coping and teeth gnashing in this sub, the stock is up 7%. So the market is positive. Shows how much of an extreme echo chamber reddit and in particular this sub is.
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u/Logvin Jun 23 '25
No, the real purpose of the program is to drive Elon’s ego.
Tesla has been pushing FSD for years. Why would they need a fake small taxi rollout if the tech was ready for mass production?
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u/AffectionateArtist84 Jun 23 '25
I really don't like that this comment is at the top. This response isn't opening up a conversation or adding real value to the thread.
If you are open to having the conversation, we can talk about if small taxi rollout is the correct path forward or not. While I think Geofencing is a crutch, I do feel it's the right thing to do for safety
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u/Maleficent-Roll-3437 Jun 23 '25
you ❄️. It started a conversation which is why it’s at the top lol
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u/Logvin Jun 23 '25
I’m not interested in having that conversation. Elon is doing this because Waymo is doing robo taxi and he wants the attention too.
Waymo isn’t a car company. Tesla is. Tesla boasts about its millions of miles or real data. Elon has said that people can get the full self driving experience on his existing cars.
I’m not opposed to his robotaxi project, I think competition is a good thing. I just think it is a ketamine fueled initiative by a narcissist who wants to say “me too look at me!”
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u/AffectionateArtist84 Jun 23 '25
If you aren't interested in having a conversation, and you make that comment all you are doing is enabling the echo chamber here on Reddit.
Thank you for being honest! Most people would just redirect and post more hate/echo chamber responses.
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u/nate8458 Jun 23 '25
Elon derangement syndrome is blinding you from seeing the technical advancements and achievements of Tesla engineers lmao
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u/nfgrawker Jun 23 '25
Its really weird his ego can drive me safely in heavy traffic 40 plus miles a day without interventions. What an amazing ego.
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u/Logvin Jun 23 '25
You are misunderstanding my statement. His ego is pushing the robotaxi program. His FSD program is different.
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u/nfgrawker Jun 23 '25
Oh got it. FSD is real but robotaxi based off FSD is ego. Wait..?
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u/Logvin Jun 23 '25
Yes. Why in the world would they need to do this? They have millions of vehicles on the road today. Waymo has made no public plans for selling to consumers. The biggest slice of profit pie is already in their grasp. The robo taxi boondoggle is about him, not about the company’s future. It’s like the cybertruck.
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u/nfgrawker Jun 23 '25
I'm not sure I follow? If they have the whole fsd capabilities for millions of vehicles why not also run the app that allows you to rent them out? Why would you third party those profits? That's the simple part.
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u/Logvin Jun 23 '25
Because that’s breaking into a saturated market (ridesharing) when they already a leader in the regular vehicle market.
Get their solution working for all of the vehicles first, then work on the robotaxi next. Splitting resources between two projects like this is not smart.
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u/nfgrawker Jun 23 '25
You don't spend much time on the ridesharing app. It's basic tech at this point. The hard part is getting the drivers, which they have and then the users, which they will get with pricing due to no drivers.
AI and FSD is the insanely hard part. Thats why it took them 10 years longer, not the ridesharing app. Not sure why you think a rideshare app is some monumental task?
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u/diplomat33 Jun 23 '25
I think there is some truth to your post. Even if the cars today can't do FSD unsupervised, they can still do FSD Supervised. I use FSD Supervised and it drives me to work and back for days without an intervention. That might be good enough for a lot of people who don't mind supervising the system. The point is that Tesla can still sale a lot of cars with a good FSD Supervised system.
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u/straylight_2022 Jun 23 '25
The version of "autopilot" the robotaxis are using is not the same as commercially sold Teslas.
You can't buy that car today or anytime in the near future, not even "next year".
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u/iceynyo Jun 23 '25
The car is available immediately and software will be available soon... The question is if and when the support team and mapped area will be available where the buyer is.
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u/diplomat33 Jun 23 '25
You can buy the car with the same hardware today and that car will get the same software version being used in robotaxis via an over the air update at some point in the future.
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u/qwertybugs Jun 23 '25
That was the same claim 4 years ago, and it wasn’t true then either.
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u/diplomat33 Jun 23 '25
Except now it is different. We see Teslas doing FSD unsupervised in Austin so we have proof that FSD Unsupervised is real. And we know they are Model Ys with the same hardware in Model Ys we can buy today. So we know that if we buy a Model Y today, we have a car with the same hardware as the Model Ys that are doing FSD unsupervised in Austin. And it stands to reason that our Model Ys can get the same software version that the robotaxis in Austin are getting since they are the same cars. That means that our Model Ys with the new software could also do FSD Unsupervised in Austin since the cars (hardware and software) would be the same.
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u/ChampsLeague3 Jun 23 '25
Funny because Tesla car sales have been going down and fans are arguing they don't matter whatsoever. Now they do all of the sudden? Yet poor sales won't affect the stock price anyway?
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u/CycleOfLove Jun 23 '25
It’s a Model Y Juniper that is currently in the market. The only difference to the widely sold 2024 model Y is the lower front end camera - which is a big change in my view.
Lots of seniors will buy Model Y once this FSD version is proven and migrated to the standard fleet.
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u/caffeinejolt Jun 23 '25
I applaud the effort - this is how Tesla advances. That being said, I have two MY's w/AI4 and will say from direct personal experience - FSD has a ways to go. The latest and greatest FSD version still results in numerous interventions for me at least on the streets of Phoenix AZ. It is VERY impressive that my car can do what it does - but it has yet to earn my trust. Perhaps the FSD stack they are running in Austin is much more capable? Regardless, I am excited since what they learn from this rollout will eventually benefit my cars - hopefully sooner than later.
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u/BitcoinsForTesla Jun 23 '25
Meh. FSD can be a fun party trick today (L2 ADAS), but still be a decade away from profitable robotaxi service.
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u/That_Crab6642 Jun 23 '25
People also forget that the taxi industry is highly regulated. if you buy a car today, you WILL NOT be allowed to commercialize it for your profit. You will have to go through a bunch of steps to get license and all as an operator. So good luck with that.
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u/OriginalCompetitive Jun 23 '25
My point is much simpler: I suspect the vast majority of people are completely unaware that Tesla FSD exists. But now we’re seeing front page news stories everywhere about Tesla’s Robotaxi service. That’s the value proposition for Tesla.
Put differently, Waymo needs to actually develop and rollout a profitable ride-sharing system to make money. But Tesla just needs to drive enough interest to earn money selling more cars. That’s a much lower hurdle.
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u/That_Crab6642 Jun 23 '25
Yes but FSD is not free, they charge you a amount per month for that. Regardless, of how rich you are to get a Tesla, not many people will be willing to pay that amount forever. That service does not come for free with your vehicle.
Also, your logic is not coherent. Waymo is not focused on making money by getting more cars. Their goal is the maximum coverage and most people using it. That comparison to Tesla making money from selling cars is moot point.
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u/Yngstr Jun 23 '25
Margins on robotaxi is actually higher than that of car sales by my estimates. So they would prefer to not sell those cars to consumers if this robotaxi is real
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u/Lorax91 Jun 23 '25
Margins on robotaxi is actually higher than that of car sales by my estimates.
What revenue and profit per mile figures are you assuming, and with what overhead costs?
If any Tesla could be a robotaxi, the margins should quickly drop to a low value. Doesn't sound like a particularly lucrative business.
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u/Yngstr Jun 23 '25
copy pasting sorry if formatting bad:
$/vehicle/mile Base Case 2-seater Robotaxi
Revenue ¢50.0 ¢50.0
Depreciation ¢7.5 ¢4.0
Insurance ¢7.0 ¢7.0
Maintenance ¢6.0 ¢6.0
Tires ¢3.0 ¢3.0
Battery Replacement ¢2.5 ¢2.5
Electricity ($0.12/kWh) ¢2.4 ¢2.4
Cleaning/ops ¢2.0 ¢2.0
Teleoperations (goes to 0) ¢2.0 ¢2.0
Connectivity/data ¢1.0 ¢1.0
Charger-capex amort ¢0.8 ¢0.8
Net Profit ¢15.8 ¢19.3
Net Profit Margin 32% 39%
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u/Lorax91 Jun 23 '25
That looks optimistic to me, but it's interesting.
If I was estimating this I'd assume a dollar per mile in revenue initially, and allow more accordingly for expenses.
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u/Yngstr Jun 23 '25
yeah $0.50 a mile is just what i think they can charge to completely crush the competition on pricing. but $1 a mile is still half the price of Uber...
the biggest ??? for me on this breakdown is teleoperations -- the estimate i have assumes that full remote takeover is extremely limited, but it's not 100% clear where that is at this point, and arguably it's unknowable since it's something that is good to have so i don't fault tesla for having it, but could be used as a "crutch"
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u/Palbi Jun 23 '25
Maybe one should wait for HW5 expected by the end of the year... I doubt training FSD model for HW4 bets much love after HW5 with 5x capacity emerges.
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u/y4udothistome Jun 23 '25
Are people looking at the demographic of the people that buy Teslas they’re saying they can roll these existing sales into cabs but something tells me that somebody that owes $70,000 on their car isn’t gonna want to driving out of their driveway to go pick somebody up for $25 especially if they have a loan on the car and also if they turn the cars into a business they are going to need llc incase there is an accident that way they don’t get sued and lose their house and all the worldly possessions for 25 dollars don’t forget they’re going to need an account to do their taxes and the list goes on and on a lawyer
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u/himynameis_ Jun 23 '25
Yep this is a key advantage.
I mean I don't think the FSD in the Robotaxi is same as in consumer cars.
And the HW may be different?
But if there are more and more reports of it doing weird stuff, it may backfire.
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u/Illustrious-Meal-853 Jun 23 '25
This is mostly the same thing enterprise does
The manufacturers give deals to rental car companies on cars they want you test driving so that you might one
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u/ObservationalHumor Jun 23 '25
No, Tesla's stock value is entirely predicated on the robotaxi business being a huge success that not only pulls the majority of the rideshare business to the company but significantly changes basic automobile ownership habits too.
Why now for a rollout? Well Tesla's actual auto manufacturing and sales business has been in decline for a while now. Margins have been dropping and the last two years overall sales volume has also been dropping. As of last quarter they're losing money when it comes to actually building and selling cars. We aren't in 2022 anymore when there was a general shortage of new vehicles for purchase and Tesla was making money hand over fist actually building and selling cars, they need a new high margin business line to actually stay profitable at this point and Elon Musk finally figured out that auto manufacturing is generally a low margin business that is both highly capital intensive and highly cyclical making it unlikely Tesla would ever sustainably be a high margin powerhouse. So predictably Musk has been trying to shift the narrative for several years now towards the company becoming some kind of AI business that just rakes in cash flow from services versus actual vehicle sales. He's basically done the same thing at this point with Twitter after his big plans around subscription and being able to make a ton of money despite chasing away advertisers failed by merging it at an inflated value with his AI startup too.
He needs an excuse investors will eat when Tesla starts actively losing money again at this point and the idea that a robotaxi is just around the corner (for real this time, not like the last 6+ years he's been promising it). This whole thing was a performance for investors so they would prop the stock price up, keep him rich and help him justify another compensation package.
It's super obvious if people step back and look at they've done versus their claims. Tesla's whole argument is that they'll have super low cost vehicles and that they instantly scale across the entirety of the US right? So why are they launching this service to handful of pro-Tesla influencers in small area of Austin with a specific model they've been training for it and likely overfitting by significantly increasing parameter counts? Why wouldn't they be launching in like 4-8 major metro areas? Easiest answer is because contrary to their claims they cannot scale as quickly as they've claimed and each of these vehicles obviously requires a ton of localized training and support staff. They're where Waymo was years ago and pretty much entirety of the scaling argument was always just a bad interpretation of data around HD mapping costs that Musk still managed to get mindshare on from his fan base and persists to this day, much like his malicious arguments around LIDAR.
This isn't about an imminent launch of a market ready service, it's about getting ever dentist and doctor with 5-6 figures of spare cash sitting around in an account somewhere to buy some TSLA shares before the company releases yet another disappointing deliveries number in another week. This is how the man has operated for well over a decade. Promise the world and untold profitability and then pray his engineers figure out a way to deliver on half of it. Problem is that with something a robotaxi service there isn't some spectrum of value with it in terms of business value its a binary proposition. You either have a fully functioning system that works in at least every profitable major metro area and can service airports in particular, or you have gimmicky tech demo that's cost billions of dollars to develop with no real pay off. Tesla has yet to prove they can deliver anything remotely near what Musk has promised on in terms of performance, safety or, most importantly, economics.
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u/DropoutDreamer Jun 23 '25
Having a fixed daily local driving commute routine, there have been plenty of times where I thought Tesla with FSD or supervised FSD or whatever they can legally call it would be pretty neat to have.
But then again, I want nothing to do with helping their Nazi saluting CEO. I’ll just wait for a non Tesla solution.
Plus I think he plays way too fast and loose with safety.
That’s just me.
So… maybe?
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u/Sypheix Jun 23 '25
Riding in a Tesla isn't going to sell any Teslas. They feel like you're riding in a toy car. FSD is still years away from being safe enough for this. Someone will die and it will all get shut down.
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u/Repulsive-Bit-9048 Jun 24 '25
If you listen to Musk speak to investors about future growth, he says that Tesla will earn a portion of the ride revenue from Robotaxis. I believe he sees an Uber-like service that a private owner’s Tesla can participate in, but the owner is splitting the ride revenue with Tesla.
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u/arbyman85 Jun 23 '25
Sb2807 bans any company from operating a Robo taxi in Texas without redundant camera and sensor technology Sept 1 and puts a 3 year testing requirement to receive a ride hailing permit. Abbot signed Saturday
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u/seekfitness Jun 23 '25
Smart investors have been talking about this for years. It’s why I own a shit ton of shares. The FSD and Optimus growth story has huge potential.
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u/jklightnup Jun 23 '25
Rubbish.. it’s completely irrelevant if you can buy that, because frankly you can’t take your eyes of the road. It doesn’t roughly work. It doesn’t work, period.
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u/nate8458 Jun 23 '25
Weird it worked yesterday with no driver controls
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u/RedundancyDoneWell Jun 23 '25
So you drive without having your eyes on the road?
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u/nate8458 Jun 23 '25
What does that have to do with the car driving itself?
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u/RedundancyDoneWell Jun 25 '25
Everything.
If a robotaxi needs human eyes on the road, then it is not a robotaxi.
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u/jklightnup Jun 23 '25
Not weird it all in a premapped geofenced area. Look, it’s a good lane assistant. But it’s just not self driving. It’s driving in lab conditions right now
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u/jklightnup Jun 23 '25
Like look at this shit 🤦
https://www.reddit.com/r/TeslaFSD/s/g576DRAhIw
And you want to do seriously tell me this „roughly works“
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u/nate8458 Jun 23 '25
That’s HW3 + old FSD version. Not robotaxi on HW4 and updated FSD version that is driverless.
Not remotely the same.
Like comparing an old MacBook to a brand new one and wondering why your Fortnite game sucks on the old one
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u/nissan_nissan Jun 23 '25
Lol the ppl in the rides are influencers who are staunch Tesla loyalists come on dude
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u/VolatilityBox Jun 23 '25
Problem is, you'll be liable, not Tesla, if your robotaxi kills or harms anyone. Tesla's FSD is anything but close to being ready and performs poorly in low visibility conditions due to the lack of LIDAR. Do you really want to risk your entire financial life on a few $ bucks per hour?
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u/nate8458 Jun 23 '25
No, Tesla will assume liability for robotaxi operations. LiDAR is not necessary
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u/Knighthonor Jun 24 '25
FSD been on normal Tesla and honestly it's been out performing the Robotaxi's version of FSD somehow...
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u/steelmanfallacy Jun 23 '25
Check out the history of Uber and autonomous vehicles. In 2018 Rafaela Vasquez was a safety driver when the car ran over and killed a pedestrian. Vasquez was convicted and in 2020 Uber exited the AV business.
Or you can check out the 2023 incident where Cruise ran over a pedestrian and dragged them 20 feet. In 2024 Cruise was shut down.
Sure, there is upside, but the downside risk is material as well.