Tesla Optimus robots will soon help the company build its electric vehicles

[Alfonso Maruccia]

In a nutshell: Musk's ambitious plan for the Optimus drone is starting to come together. The humanoid robots will begin their commercial journey inside Tesla factories, assembling electric vehicles. With a price tag in the tens of thousands, it will be a while before they move from industrial labor to more domestic chores in customer homes.

Tesla will begin using a small amount of Optimus robots for its internal operations next year, while "high production" for third-party companies will hopefully start in 2026. Elon Musk shared the new timeline via X, and he is already behind the previously announced schedule for using Optimus at Tesla.

Optimus will be helpful on the company's manufacturing floor. Musk did not specify the robots' duties. The new timeline is a slight setback, as he had previously said that the bots would be ready for Tesla factories by the end of this year.

Tesla will have genuinely useful humanoid robots in low production for Tesla internal use next year and, hopefully, high production for other companies in 2026

– Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 22, 2024

Despite pushing for AI, robotics, and everything in between, like most of today's tech moguls, Musk's ambition is now burdened by more pressing issues. Tesla electric vehicle sales are down, and profits have dropped by almost half, from $2.7 billion to $1.5 billion in the quarter that ended in June.

Tesla's focus is now on company-wide cost reduction efforts, and Optimus bots could excel in that regard. A robot doesn't need to eat, sleep, or rest. Optimus was built to excel in performing the unsafe, repetitive, or tedious tasks that humans still do on the production line.

Musk previously projected that Tesla would soon start mass-producing robots costing less than $20,000 each for end customers. He also predicted that the company could one day swell to an unprecedented $25 trillion valuation thanks to its robotic tech. The ongoing vision is to improve Optimus bots to the point where they would fit nicely into domestic situations as companions, housekeepers, or babysitters.

Tesla isn't the only company currently working to embed robotics and drones into its manufacturing process. Honda and Boston Dynamics have come a long way with their early prototypes. They are now actively working to build a commercial venture based on all these robotic experiments over the years.

Traditional carmakers around the world are working on robotic tech as well. Recently, BMW partnered with robotics firm Figure to automate factories, using neural network algorithms to help with object recognition and manipulation. Several big tech AI players, including Nvidia and OpenAI, helped fund Figure. Jeff Bezos is interested in the machine learning-driven bots as well.

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Tesla Optimus robots will soon help the company build its electric vehicles

 

[Kinemon]

Yeah and a tesla will be able to smart summon from NYC to LA by 2016

 

[Dimitriid]

Pretty sure robots already build most other cars: car industry was a leading sector when it came to automation several decades ago but hey, these will be Elon robots:he'll claim they'll be more capable and autonomous and miracle workers but end up just making already questionably-unsafe cars even more so but at least he named it after a cartoon character mostly just millennial dorks care about.

 

[BuckarooBonzaii]

We should all know by now that AI, robotics and developing tech are for people after GenZ. Those before don't count as we will die out.

 

[Godel]

" , , , improve Optimus bots to the point where they would fit nicely into domestic situations as companions, housekeepers, or babysitters."

And who wouldn't be happy to trust your darling children in the hands of one of Musky's metal men?

/s

 

[Endymio]

And who wouldn't be happy to trust your darling children in the hands of one of Musky's metal men?

Given the number of children neglected, injured, verbally, physically, or sexually abused, sometimes even killed by daycare workers and babysitters -- sometimes their own family members -- I'll gladly trust a "metal man" with behavior certified by thousands of professional engineers. In fact, I'd be willing to bet -- at any odds you care to name -- that even the earliest incarnation of such robotic workers are statistically at least 100X safer than having your child overseen by any human hired help.

Pretty sure robots already build most other cars.

A fixed-in-place pre-programmed articulated arm able to perform only one single predetermined task may fit the definition of a robot -- but only just. It's really not much more technologically advanced than 1940s-level automated assembly lines. The inflexibility of such "robots" are in fact a primary reason automotive tech and design changes so slowly; even a minor alteration can necessitate reconfiguring much of the production floor.

 

[jeffbert]

Maybe by then, AI robots will have junk so they too, can sexually abuse children.

Seriously, I tried watching MOTHER, the film about a girl being raised by a cyclopean robot that did not much resemble a human mother, but after about 10 minutes, switched it off. I hope any domestic robots have actual faces; perhaps making them too human-like is a error, rather cartoony - type faces might be better. Soft skin might also help for nanny-bots; pleasant voices too. Warmth, too! Might use capillaries to circulate coolant, keep the CPU cool, make the skin warm. Maybe I should patent the idea!

In closing, I offer three words:

CRUSH, KILL, DESTROY!