Tesla has been testing a robotaxi service in the Bay Area for the past few months, Elon Musk said during the company’s earnings call Wednesday.
The company’s employees have been able to summon an autonomously operated Tesla vehicle for trips using the company’s prototype ride-hailing app, Musk said. The vehicles arrive with safety drivers behind the wheel, ready to intervene in case anything goes wrong.
But Musk said the vehicles are operating autonomously using the latest version of the company’s Full Self-Driving software, which he said will be “1000 times better” than human driving by the second quarter of 2025.
The company first teased several screenshots of a ride-hailing function in its app earlier this year. The first screen shows a big button that says “Summon” with a lower message for the possible wait time. The next screen has a 3D map with a little virtual vehicle following a route to the waiting passenger. It looks a lot like the Uber app — but more Tesla-y.
