Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk presented a lofty vision for the future Thursday night, unveiling prototypes of a self-driving taxi and van that he said would revolutionize travel and claiming the electric car company would put fully autonomous vehicles on the road by next year.
At an event on the Warner Bros. Studios lot in Burbank, Musk rolled out examples of what he dubbed the Cybercab. The futuristic, metallic silver vehicles lacked steering wheels, pedals and rearview mirrors. Invited guests took short rides around the studio’s closed roads.
A lot is riding on the Cybercab for Musk, who has been selling unfulfilled promises of autonomous vehicles for years.
Although Tesla’s sales of its signature electric cars stumbled early in 2024, the company has an $800-billion market capitalization built largely on the expectation that it will be able to overtake competitors to dominate the burgeoning robotaxi market.
Whether Tesla is anywhere close to completing its push to develop the technology needed to do so, however, remains an open question.
On Friday, investors signaled they were skeptical of Musk’s latest claims. At 10:55 a.m Pacific time, shares of Tesla stock were trading at about $219.50, down 8% on the day.
“Investors have clearly been very excited about this for many years even though Tesla hasn’t delivered on it,” said Sam Abuelsamid, a transportation analyst at Guidehouse Insights.
“Tesla’s valuation is much higher relative to their revenues and their profits and that is almost entirely based on the presumption that they will suddenly start generating mountains of new profits,” he said.
Faced with falling global sales and a tumbling stock price, Tesla has slashed prices again on some of its electric vehicles and its “Full Self Driving” system. Tesla releases first-quarter earnings Tuesday, April 23, 2024.
