Tesla’s push to refocus on humanoid robots and autonomous vehicles may be headed for a slower start than CEO Elon Musk’s bullish timelines previously promised.
Musk said Tuesday that production for the company’s planned Cybercab robotaxis and its humanoid Optimus robots will “ramp” slower than expected, even as he sells investors on a future powered by AI and automation.
With the important caveat that initial production is always very slow and follows an S-curve.
The speed of the production ramp is inversely proportionate to how many new parts and steps there are.
For Cybercab and Optimus, almost everything is new, so the early production…
“Initial production is always very slow and follows an S-curve,” Musk argued. “The speed of the production ramp is inversely proportionate to how many new parts and steps there are.”
For some of Tesla’s most innovative products, such as the Cybercab and Optimus, this pattern is especially true, he noted.
“Almost everything is new, so the early production rate will be agonizingly slow, but eventually end up being insanely fast,” he said.
Tesla did not immediately respond to Fortune’s request for comment.
Yet Tesla’s fourth-quarter deliveries of 418,200 vehicles fell slightly short of the analyst-expected 422,900 vehicles. The lower-priced Standard Model 3 and Model Y vehicles carried Tesla’s deliveries and slightly surpassed expectations, while its other models fell thousands of deliveries short, according to a note from Wedbush analyst Dan Ives.
Still, Tesla’s fourth-quarter results were not as bad as some expected, Ives wrote in the note. Plus, its growing energy business and its foray into more niche markets to offset setbacks in China and Europe could indicate “a step in the right direction” for the company looking forward to 2026.
“We believe Tesla could reach a $2 trillion market cap over the coming year and in a bull case scenario $3 trillion by the end of 2026 … as full-scale volume production begins with the autonomous and robotics road map,” Ives wrote.
