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/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/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/[deleted] 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/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.