- Tesla CEO Elon Musk unveiled a humanoid robot prototype during his company’s AI day, demonstrating the company’s advances in the field of robotics.
- The robot uses some software derived from Tesla’s Autopilot to steer itself, and is powered by a 2.3-kWh battery.
- Tesla intends for the robot to be a worker that could perform tasks in a factory or office setting, indicating that it plans to mass produce the robot in the future.
Just over a year after it was first previewed by “a guy in a suit,” Elon Musk’s robot was revealed in prototype form. In a debut several observers immediately compared to a robot debut from Robocop 2, one of the prototypes waved to the crowd after four technicians feverishly scrambled around it to get it ready. Indeed, the presentation featured more than its fair share of Verhoevean themes.
The humanoid robot, dubbed Optimus, uses some of the software developed for Tesla’s Autopilot driver assist system, Musk revealed, and is powered by a 2.3-kWh battery pack. The automaker plans to mass-produce the robot with the CEO indicating that production could start next year, while also painting a more fluid timeline that could stretch into years in other comments.
The overall goal of the robot—according to various statements made by Elon Musk over the past year—stretch from gardening to office work, as well as working alongside humans at a car assembly plant. Even a price tag was mentioned, one which should probably be taken with a grain of salt: $20,000.
The company showed a short video of Optimus, tethered via a cord to something on the ceiling, moving through an office and performing various physical tasks. The programming and task direction that would be required for these jobs to be done by a robot was outlined in far less detail. How an owner would instruct the robot, for instance, to go plant potatoes or do other types of labor was left to the imagination.
Tesla would be far from the first automaker to jump into the field of robotics.
Honda and Toyota have been working on humanoid robots for well over a decade, with Honda’s Asimo the best known of the genre.
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Hyundai, which purchased Boston Dynamics a couple of years ago, has a wide variety of robots at its disposal, including ones that can jump, do parkour, and manipulate complex objects.
As some have since pointed out, Tesla could have just purchased Boston Dynamics two years ago (arguably at a considerable bargain) if it wanted to skip a decade of research and development, and would now be leading this industry.
During the demo, Tesla’s Optimus robot did not exceed any of the feats we’ve seen over the years from Asimo or the variety of the Boston Dynamics robots, and Musk never gave a clear timeline for the project’s evolution from prototype to production—or the actual utility it could eventually offer buyers.
“The importance of Optimus will become apparent in the coming years,” Musk promised earlier this year.
It’s also worth noting none of the automakers with plenty of experience building robots of various types have yet to profit from these programs, and so far none of them have offered a humanoid robot to the general public. Robotics researchers have also often noted that humanoid robots, despite looking futuristic, are actually not an optimal shape for working in manufacturing settings, where quite a few robots are currently used.
Mass production of the robot, as many have noted, will require new factory space, as well as assembly by humans that will involve far fewer robots than Tesla’s car production currently does. It would also divert Tesla resources from car production.
Moreover, the debut of the robot late on a Friday (when companies usually bury bad news) had a different feel to it than the company’s other presentations—and none of the spectacle of Tesla’s past new vehicle reveals, the last of which involved the Cybertruck.
Speaking of the Cybertruck, the automaker is still tentatively scheduled to begin producing the electric model sometime in the second half of next year at its Austin plant. At the moment Tesla is working to get its two newest plants, Berlin and Austin, up to their designed output while facing some manufacturing challenges.
Is this a worthwhile direction for Tesla to pursue, or should it focus on electric cars? Let us know in the comments below.
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