Tesla’s Optimus humanoid robotic was first introduced by the EV maker on the AI Day occasion in August 2021, which implies it is going to quickly be two years previous.
So when will it’s available for purchase? Effectively, it is nonetheless too quickly to speak about that, as growth of the robotic remains to be within the early levels. The Tesla Bot was proven in a video in Could strolling and choosing up stuff, and that was just about every little thing it was in a position to do on the time.
On Tesla’s Q2 2023 earnings name yesterday, a retail investor requested for an replace on the progress of the robotic’s capabilities and requested data on what number of Optimus robots the corporate has made up to now.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk joked that 10 million Optimus robots have been energetic earlier than revealing the far much less spectacular actuality. “I feel we’re round 5 or 6 bots… Nevertheless it’s type of – sure, there’s extra each month. There’s loads of fascinating issues in regards to the Optimus bot,” Musk stated, in accordance with Looking for Alpha (through Teslarati).
He famous that Tesla has constructed a small variety of robots up to now principally as a result of the corporate has actuator provide points. Extra particularly, Tesla realized that there have been no off-the-shelf actuators that “labored properly” for Optimus.
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Because of this, Tesla needed to design and construct the actuators itself. The actuator is a key part for robots because it creates movement by changing saved power into mechanical work.
“So, we have really needed to design our personal actuators that combine the motor or the facility electronics, the controller, the sensors. And actually, each considered one of them is customized. After which, after all, we’ll be utilizing the identical inference {hardware} because the automotive,” Elon Musk defined. He added that Tesla is designing these actuators for quantity manufacturing.
“So, they are not simply lighter, tighter, and extra succesful than every other actuators wherever that exists on this planet, nevertheless it’s additionally really manufacturable. So, we must always be capable of make them in quantity.”
Tesla’s head honcho stated the primary “type of manufacturing candidate actuators built-in and strolling must be round November-ish,” with a manufacturing ramp to comply with shortly after that.
Musk stated in Could that Optimus was “extraordinarily underrated” and had large potential for the corporate. He stated it could not be shocking if Tesla’s enterprise sooner or later is constructed on the again of its humanoid robotic, for which he predicted demand as excessive as 10 to twenty billion items.
Because of this, the robotic would far outnumber Tesla’s world automobile fleet, with which it shares the Full Self-Driving software program.