Tesla’s Struggle with Unsupervised Self-Driving on HW4: What Does This Mean for Customers?
Tesla has recently faced criticism regarding its self-driving efforts, particularly in relation to its HW4 hardware. During a quarterly conference call, the automaker admitted that ‘unsupervised self-driving is not solved’ on HW4, despite using this hardware in its Robotaxi service in Austin, Texas.
For the past year, Tesla CEO Elon Musk has been promoting the launch of an “unsupervised robotaxi” service in Austin, Texas, with a planned launch in June. However, it was soon revealed that the robotaxi service actually had a supervisor in the front passenger seat with a kill switch, contradicting Musk’s claims of unsupervised self-driving.
Although Musk has emphasized that the Robotaxis in Austin are using the same hardware as customer vehicles, Tesla’s head of self-driving, Ashok Elluswamy, admitted that unsupervised self-driving has not been solved on HW4. This has raised concerns among HW3 owners, as they may have to wait for Tesla to address this issue before any retrofitting can be done on their cars.
The ongoing discrepancies in Tesla’s self-driving capabilities have led to skepticism among customers and observers. Musk’s repeated claims of achieving unsupervised self-driving in customer vehicles by the end of the year, in certain geographical areas, have not been substantiated by the current state of the Robotaxi service in Austin.
As the debate continues, it remains uncertain when Tesla will be able to achieve unsupervised self-driving on HW4 cars. This uncertainty has left HW3 owners, some of whom purchased their cars back in 2016, in a state of limbo as they wait for Tesla to address these issues.
Overall, the situation raises questions about Tesla’s ability to deliver on its promises of self-driving technology. With mounting pressure and scrutiny, it remains to be seen how Tesla will navigate this challenge and whether it will meet the expectations of its customers.
