Elon Musk unveiled a prototype of Tesla’s Robovan on Thursday evening throughout the firm’s We, Robotic occasion in Los Angeles. The Robovan can be an electrical, autonomous automobile roughly the scale of a bus, designed for transporting folks round excessive density areas. It would carry as much as 20 folks at a time and likewise transport items, in response to Musk.
“We’re going to make this, and it’s going to appear to be that,” mentioned Musk on Thursday evening because the Robovan rolled in direction of middle stage. That’s about as a lot as Musk was keen to say, and we’re not even certain that a lot is true.
Musk didn’t point out how a lot the Robovan would price, how Tesla would produce it, or when it would come out. Nevertheless, it does look fairly cool.
The Robovan has a retro-futuristic look – someplace between a bus from The Jetsons and a toaster from the Nineteen Fifties. It options silver metallic sides with black particulars, and strips of sunshine operating parallel to the bottom alongside its sides, with doorways that slide out from the center. Inside, there are seats and room to face, with tinted home windows all through. There isn’t a steering wheel, because it’s autonomous.
“One of many issues we need to do – and we’ve accomplished this with the Cybertruck – is we need to change the look of the roads,” mentioned Musk. “The longer term ought to appear to be the longer term,” he mentioned, repeating an previous line.
It appears just like different purpose-built robotaxis, like these designed by Zoox and Cruise. Solely Tesla’s van is way larger. In China, WeRide has constructed an identical Robobus.
That mentioned, the Robovan confirmed on Thursday is just a prototype. Regardless of what Musk says, there’s no telling what the true factor will appear to be or when it would truly come out.
Tesla had saved the design of the autos it launched on Thursday fairly near the chest. The one actual trace we had was from Tesla’s 2023 Investor Day, when the automaker teased a few new autos that seemed to be designed for quantity manufacturing: One smaller automobile that seems now to be the Cybercab, and a bigger one which we will now say is probably going the Robovan.
The acknowledged purpose on the time was to supply 20 million autos per yr by 2030. That will imply that Tesla wants to extend manufacturing and gross sales by about 15 instances from 2022.
Throughout Thursday’s occasion, Musk didn’t define any plans for constructing new manufacturing amenities or retooling current amenities to accommodate both the Cybercab or the Robovan. He additionally didn’t present a lot in the way in which of timelines for the Robovan, although he predicted the Cybercab would begin manufacturing in 2026 or 2027.
