Tesla’s robot waves but can’t walk, yet. Musk plans to make millions of them
Tesla CEO Elon Musk showed off on Friday a prototype of its humanoid robot ‘Optimus,’ predicting the electric vehicle maker would be able to produce millions.
SAN FRANCISCO — Tesla CEO Elon Musk showed off on Friday a prototype of its humanoid robot ‘Optimus,’ predicting the electric vehicle maker would be able to produce millions and sell them for under $20,000 — less than a third of the price of a Model Y.
Musk said he expected Tesla would be ready to take orders for the robot in three to five years, and described an effort to develop the product over a decade or more, the most detailed vision he has provided to date on a business he has said could be bigger than Tesla’s EV revenue.
Tesla’s push to design and build mass-market robots that would also be tested by working jobs in its factories sets it apart from other manufacturers that have experimented with humanoid robots.
The eagerly awaited reveal of prototype robots at Tesla’s office in Palo Alto, California was also part of what Musk has described as an effort to have Tesla seen as a leader in fields like artificial intelligence, not just a company that makes “cool cars.”
An experimental test robot that Tesla said was developed in February walked out to wave at the crowd on Friday, and Tesla showed a video of it doing simple tasks, such as watering plants, carrying boxes and lifting metal bars at a production station at the company’s California plant.
https://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/tesla-humanoid-robot-elon-musk-cant-walk-rcna50307
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