There has been a lot of “Elon has gone crazy” articles lately. That has primarily been due to Tesla staff layoffs but his canceling his trip to India because he decided going to China was more important seemed strange. Well, things are starting to make more sense.
What Elon got in China was government permission to go ahead with testing robotaxies there. There is more about it by The Electric Viking
If you go back in time you will probably know that Elon seemed to be more interested in robotaxis than what has been called the Model 2. The story goes that Franz came up with a design for a car that could be both — that is pretty much the same car with a different interior. We have then seen Elon lower the priority of the consumer car. Most everyone saw that as crazy for two reasons:
- There is currently a big demand for a lower-priced Tesla consumer car
- While a robotaxi sounds very appealing the idea of getting regulators, particularly those in every US state to approve it will be time consuming
With the approval Musk got from the Chinese government, it could mean robotaxis could appear in China first. That’s a huge market but, probably more important, it could be the example the world needs to move forward with their acceptance.
So far, Elon seems to have been making the right chess moves. August 8 has been set for the next reveal from Tesla of what is happening with the robotaxi. Stay tuned.
