Tesla Model Y makes first autonomous delivery with robotaxi tech

Tesla has announced what it describes as the first “autonomous delivery” of a customer vehicle.

A Model Y SUV covered a 15-mile route from Tesla’s factory to a buyer’s apartment in Austin, Texas.

The car used Tesla’s experimental robotaxi software but was downgraded to Full Self-Driving (Supervised) upon arrival, requiring human oversight.

CEO Elon Musk said the vehicle navigated complex routes without passengers or remote assistance, and Tesla posted a 30-minute video of the journey.

The demonstration comes ahead of Tesla’s Q2 results and follows past criticism, including a 2016 staged video of autonomous driving.

Critics have expressed doubts regarding the self-driving software’s ability to consistently and safely perform such a drive.

Tesla has not responded to media inquiries about these concerns.

🔗 Source: TechCrunch

🧠 Food for thought

1️⃣ Tesla’s autonomous milestones follow a pattern of promise and delivery gap

Tesla’s autonomous delivery demonstration follows a long-established pattern of bold promises followed by more limited real-world implementations.

In 2016, Musk announced that Tesla would achieve a fully autonomous cross-country drive from Los Angeles to New York, a milestone that has yet to materialize despite repeated promises1.

That same year, Tesla released a promotional video showing a car driving itself through the Bay Area, which was later revealed to be misleading when a Tesla engineer testified that multiple attempts were needed and that the “intent of the video was not to accurately portray what was available for customers”2.

This latest autonomous delivery, while impressive for navigating complex scenarios, exists in the context of previous ambitious timelines that have been repeatedly extended or scaled back.

Tesla has historically used terminology around its autonomous capabilities that industry critics consider vague or potentially misleading, contributing to consumer confusion about actual autonomy levels1.