Tesla's Robotaxi, Long Promised by Elon Musk, Joins a Crowded Field
Austin is known for live music, Texas' premier public university and being home to tech companies. It is also becoming a laboratory for autonomous vehicles.
Driverless Waymo taxis, owned by Google's parent company, regularly drop off diners at Austin's famous barbecue joints. Box-shaped, four-wheeled robots operated by Avride, a start-up working with Uber Eats, deliver Thai takeout to customers downtown. Zoox, owned by Amazon, and Volkswagen are separately testing autonomous taxis here.
Tesla, the electric car company based in Austin, recently joined the party, rolling out self-driving Model Ys ahead of a taxi service that is expected to begin offering rides as soon as Sunday. The vehicles, which the company calls Robotaxis, are part of an audacious effort by Elon Musk, Tesla's chief executive, to leap ahead of Waymo, which dominates a nascent business that someday could be worth tens of billions of dollars and perhaps much more.
But the busy streets of Austin show that Tesla will face significant competition and other challenges. It will have to engage in painstaking experimentation to perfect its technology, which some autonomous-driving experts have criticized for having fewer safeguards than those operated by Waymo and other companies.
Also, Tesla is starting from behind. Waymo has been driving paying passengers for years in Phoenix, San Francisco and Los Angeles, and started its commercial service in Austin in March in partnership with Uber.
A small fleet of Tesla Robotaxis will begin carrying passengers in Austin on June 22, Mr. Musk said on X last week but added that the company may delay the start of the service. But analysts expect the cars will be available only to company employees or invited guests. The service will probably not be available to the general public for several months, analysts said.
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