Tesla Robots Bigger than Cars Says Elon Musk

Elon Musk told investors that his company’s robots, called “Tesla Bots,” will likely overtake their signature electric vehicles in popularity.

Musk, speaking to investors on an earnings call for the company, said that his forthcoming robots have “the potential to be more significant than the vehicle business, over time.” The project is officially known as ‘Optimus,’ with the individual robot itself being referred to as Tesla Bot.

Musk, in line with his famous sense of humor, previewed the project last year using a human in a suit in lieu of a prototype. Despite this stunt, the tech billionaire takes the Tesla Bot, very, very seriously– he told investors on the same call that it is Tesla’s most important project for 2022.

The robots will be made with the same artificial intelligence (AI) system used in Tesla’s vehicles and will stand 5ft 8 inches with a screen installed as a face.

Musk tweeted earlier this week that “Tesla AI might play a role in AGI [artificial general intelligence], given that it trains against the outside world, especially with the advent of Optimus.”

AGI is a controversial field that involves training AI to learn and complete tasks that are typically thought to be exclusively human. It is commonly associated with the conception of AI’s learning to think and behave like people and gain their own agency, which could be dangerous. Musk replied to the tweet insisting that “Decentralised control of the robots will be critical.”

Elon Musk’s big plans for Tesla and SpaceX

Musk has big plans in the making at all of his respective companies. The world’s richest man said earlier that his company SpaceX plans to send humans to Mars within the next ten years. Musk was interviewed on an episode of the Lex Fridman Podcast, where he spoke at length about his company’s goals for reaching the Red Planet.

Fridman asked Musk what he thought a likely timeline was for the project, to which the world’s richest man replied: “Best case is about five years, worst case 10 years.”

Musk said that success hinges on “engineering the vehicle,” noting that “Starship is the most complex and advanced rocket that’s ever been made.” Starship is the latest model of rocket manufactured by SpaceX.

“The fundamental optimization of Starship is minimizing the cost per ton to orbit — and ultimately cost per ton to orbit and ultimately cost per ton to the surface of Mars,” Musk explained on the podcast.

Musk made it clear that the mission stands apart from everything humans have accomplished in space before, saying that “no amount of money can get you a ticket to Mars.”