Tesla Pushes Back Robotaxi Reveal, Surprising No One

Photo: Apu Gomes (Getty Images)

Just like Elon Musk’s perpetual promises of Full Self-Driving, Tesla is delaying the reveal of its wishfully lucrative Robotaxi from its planned August 8 date all the way to October. Musk is all-in on the autonomous taxi project to reinvigorate the struggling electric automaker, reportedly at the cost of the mass-market $25,000 Model 2.

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Tesla made its employees aware of the delay through internal communications, Bloomberg reports. The manufacturer needs more time to build the Robotaxi prototypes. I wonder how long it’s going to take for Musk to call the report a lie. This Hail Mary play for autonomous vehicles came to light in April, and then Tesla laid off roughly ten percent of its workforce in the following weeks.

Only time will tell if the Robotaxi is actually launched in October and not delayed again. Musk’s history of promising transformative innovations goes beyond the near-annual cry that true self-driving cars are just around the corner. The company killed plans to widely adopt gigacasting in its manufacturing process. So many experimental features were culled or pushed aside. The awful steering yoke is now a paid option and infotainment support for Steam games was dropped.

Musk’s ambitious aims are intended to either stroke his own ego or placate frustrated investors. Shareholders ravenously crave the growth that Tesla delivered in the past, but the company has stagnated as its rivals catch up in the marketplace and sales are nowhere near stated targets. Promised projects are just plaster covering the cracks, and it is not clear how long this facade will hold.