Analysts criticise lack of detail about the ‘robotaxi’ showcased by CEO Elon Musk

Tesla shares fell nearly 9% on Friday, wiping about $60bn (£45bn) from the company’s value, after the long-awaited unveiling of its so-called robotaxi failed to excite investors.

Shares in the electric carmaker tumbled to $217 at market close following an event in Hollywood, where the chief executive, Elon Musk, revealed a much-hyped driverless vehicle. The stock price is down roughly 12% year-to-date.

However, analysts said the event was short on detail and also expressed disappointment over a lack of specifics about other Tesla projects. Musk has a history of making grand projections about upcoming products and failing to follow through in the timeframe he has set, or at all.

    • Sterile_Technique@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      Even at face value, that’s still a massive red flag coming Musk. He gave us a concept of the cybertruck that actually looked pretty badass; then delivered a vehicle straight out the Playstation 1. Any concept he pitches can be assumed to be complete bullshit.

      • friendlymessage@feddit.org
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        1 month ago

        That thing looks AI generated. Better than what we got but still ridiculous. I mean, it’s huge but still somehow doesn’t really seem to have much space for passengers or cargo at the same time

        Also, why is the cabin aerodynamic while the hood is not? The whole thing is nonsensical

      • normanwall@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        Lol this thing with a heavy battery would flip over at the mere sight of a bump, and everyone would die inside

        • filcuk@lemmy.zip
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          1 month ago

          The center of mass is lower due to the battery, so I’d say the opposite is true.

    • TheBrideWoreCrimson@sopuli.xyz
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      1 month ago

      It might not be a particularly new insight, but I find it worth repeating anyway: Musk truly is the new Ford. Runs his own company in the ground and has a hard-on for fascists.

      • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        With a bit of Edison thrown in for good measure. He’s constantly claiming to have invented things or founded companies that he had nothing to do with.

  • affiliate@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    one of my old computer science professors said self driving cars “have been 5 years away for the past 20 years”. still rings true to this day

      • ✺roguetrick✺@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        Oh nobody’s predicting net positive fusion anytime soon. There’s huge materials hurdles in both magnetic confinement and inertial confinement while also regenerating tritium. Neutron radiation just does not play nice.

    • dejected_warp_core@lemmy.world
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      I agree with your professor. It’s one of these things that people have a hard time understanding. A lot of folks can easily imagine the end-state, but have no clue what has to be solved to arrive there. A lot of folks think that projects in electronics, software engineering, computing, etc. are just a linear march from beginning to end; failure is a human or resource problem. In reality, there are problems out there that get exponentially harder to pull off with linear inputs, which is much harder to imagine let alone a great way to scare off investors.

      In this case, the framing of the problem is all wrong. We’re not trying to solve “a car that drives itself” (e.g. autopilot). Instead we are “simulating human sensory organs and cognition in order to pilot a vehicle without catastrophe or injury.” The latter is much harder to solve, but IMO, is a much more realistic portrayal of the job.

  • EnderMB@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    I just don’t get why they still have him as CEO.

    The man spends his time mostly on Twitter, driving it into the ground to simp for Trump. He’s taken obscene amounts of money from it, while failing to offer the simplest of products from its roadmap a decade ago - an affordable electric car.

    If they don’t pivot in the next few years, they’ll run the risk of Tesla being leapfrogged to market more than it already has, with an inferior product to practically everyone that enters the EV market.

    I still fully maintain that Musk will push Tesla towards making a petrol-powered car within the next few years, so IMO the board needs to get rid before that becomes a thing.

      • Aceticon@lemmy.world
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        I suspect sometime ago it switched from belief in him to most market players believing that “enough people will believe this guy’s shit that the line will go up so best jump in early”, essentially a self-made prophecy as long as enough people believe that others believe.

        In that sense this result of his presentation pushing the line down A LOT means that even the idea that no matter how much he’s lying he will move the market up is finished and his bullshit being a Midas Touch has now reached the natural endlife of becoming a Shit Touch.

        That being so, has much more massive implications for Elon’s business success and wealth as well as that of companies links to him, than merely the market losses in this one instance, since he is very much a One Trick Pony whose “bullshitter of tech fanboys” trick has stopped working and nobody is going to be betting on Elon pushing the line up anymore, the core of his success in getting wildass ideas funded and his companies in non-Tech industries getting Tech-style market valuations.

        The next couple of years for Elon are going to be really “interesting”.

        • Poop@lemmy.ca
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          1 month ago

          Could not agree more. I’m hoping he has a Hindenburg moment… Soon

    • TriflingToad@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      I imagine the robotaxi it gonna just be some really short person under the hood running super fast like the Flintstones with a steering wheel

  • Blackmist@feddit.uk
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    1 month ago

    Bro. Just one more year bro. I swear bro. Just one more year and we’ll have full self driving bro.

    Don’t lose faith bro. Or I’ll sue you and call you a pedo guy.

  • Scolding7300@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    What problems do autonomous taxies solve that are worth this investment of possibly decades?

    Edit: grammar

      • Fedizen@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        the feds would have to start issueing grants for light rail like they do with roads for that to happen. Otherwise cities will always default to a free road over a paid train system

    • Fedizen@lemmy.world
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      none. But they would have to be electric so that they don’t lose fuel economy as 3x the number of cars on the road will 100% create traffic jams.

      • Scolding7300@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        And even then the amount of energy wasted on traveling empty from drop offs to pickups would probably be collossal. Not to speak of the infrastructure we don’t have to keep these charged

  • b161@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    Nooo they didn’t like the self-driving robotaxi that isn’t self driving. What about the bus that can’t go over a pothole? No? How about robots that are controlled and voiced by humans? Damn. Tough crowd.

    • Aceticon@lemmy.world
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      Also there’s this whole track record of Elon Musk’s demonstrations were there’s no clear independent validation that they actually work as we are being said they to or they’re merelly announcements or concepts: those things are invariably complete total bollock at best bordering on Fraud.

      I reckon that finally he has entirely exhausted both the benefit of the doubt that his demonstrations are in any way honest and representative of real products present or future, and the idea that “he might be bullshitting but he’ll pull in enough suckers that early investors will win from going all in even if it’s 100% bollocks”.

      The Midas Touch of Elon’s bullshit has finally ran its course and turned into a Shit Touch.

  • Furbag@lemmy.world
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    It won’t be $30k, it won’t be full self driving, it won’t be ready for production by by 2027, it won’t replace all cars on the road by 2075.

    It’s shocking that people aren’t calling him out on the fact that he also promised every Tesla on the road today would be capable of becoming a robotaxi, which was just an outrageous lie at the time and evidently they are no longer working towards making that plan a reality anymore if they’re designing dedicated autonomous vehicles. Letting him pitch a new robotaxi idea feels like letting him get away not having to face any consequences for his blatant bullshit.

    • stringere@sh.itjust.works
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      No Tesla will, correct.

      These cars will be available, just not where governments stand on the scale for industries that refuse to modernize or make vehicles that a lot of people actually want instead of another oversized SUV or truck with a grill taller than a tank.

  • SloppyPuppy@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    “And all transport will be fully autonomous within 50 years.”

    Bro even cold fusion reactors have less estimation than that.

  • Gammelfisch@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Awe shucks. Tesla should boot out Dork MAGAT and bring back Eberhard and Tarpenning. When Leon leaves, then I will consider a Tesla.

  • Chestnut@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    For clarity, this means the stock is back to the price it was in September. I know car-man-bad but I get tired of these sensationalized articles that are only shared because they confirm that someone we like is bad actually