From “The Matrix” and “Interstellar” to “Blade Runner” and more, Warner Brothers Studios has long specialized in providing compelling—and occasionally terrifying—visions of the future. This track record, plus the surplus of props and ready-made backdrops, made Warner Brothers’ Burbank, California studios the ideal place for Tesla to unveil its own take on the future of public transportation. In early October, the movie studio played host to Tesla’s “We, Robot” event, a one-night spectacle that saw the EV brand unveil two new fully autonomous vehicles, as well as a humanoid robot that wouldn’t look out of place in one of the Warner Brothers’ sci-fi blockbusters.
The star of the show was the Cybercab, a forthcoming, fully autonomous two-door hatchback that can theoretically whisk two passengers around town without the high fares and awkward small talk of the typical taxi or rideshare experience. The prototype Cybercab featured an expectedly futuristic design with a sleek silver body, silver wheel covers, butterfly doors, and front and rear light bars that closely resemble some self-driven vehicles of Hollywood fame; an uncanny similarity has already seen Tesla hit with a lawsuit from the production company behind 2017’s “Blade Runner 2049” for some of the imagery used during the event.
What’s lurking under the hood remains largely a mystery for the time being, but we do know that the Cybercab will employ a wireless inductive charging system that will allow the self-driving vehicle to top off its own battery without any human intervention and will be offered with full self-driving (FSD) in California and Texas, pending regulatory approval. So when can we expect to see the Cybercab hit the road? What’s the story behind the larger Robovan? And were those viral, cowboy-hat-wearing Tesla robots really all they were cracked up to be? We’ll dive into all of that as we track Tesla’s attempt to bring a little movie magic into the real world.
A New Type of Taxi?
With an announced price of $30,000, the Cybercab aims to fill a unique niche in the market. The robotaxi can be purchased as a personal vehicle, though the company envisions buyers investing in a full fleet of Cybercabs that can be operated as taxis with exceptionally low overhead. Musk says the autonomous cabs could halve the current taxi fare of around $1 per mile, offering rates as low as 30 to 40 cents per mile after taxes. Individual owners could theoretically rent out their Cybercab much in the same way that a homeowner or landlord might put an apartment or house on Airbnb to make a little extra cash.
Whether this model works from a business perspective is hard to say. While it’s true that most private vehicles sit idle for over 90 percent of the day, taxis also tend to experience an accelerated level of wear and tear while logging tens of thousands of miles per year. This isn’t the first time Tesla has flirted with the concept—the EV brand has been talking about autonomous ride-sharing since as early as 2016—but there was no mention of any concrete plans during the We, Robot event.
The Cybercab is slated for a 2026 debut with the goal of producing two million units per year, though even Musk admits that his timelines tend to be “a little optimistic.” Tesla currently has no test permits, or even applications for test permits, for its self-driving technology, which could act as a real bottleneck in the Cybercab rollout. However, it has plenty of data from the “Supervised FSD” available on current Tesla models. The Tesla CEO’s close relationship with the incoming administration could help to smooth out some of the regulatory bumps in the road, but FSD has long remained out of reach for even the ambitious and exceedingly well-funded EV brand.
Playing Catch-Up In FSD
The We, Robot event also served as the debut for the Robovan, a larger version of the robotaxi designed to accommodate as many as 20 passengers. Engineered with a minimalist design and sliding side doors that could allow it to double as a spacious cargo vehicle, the vehicle’s exact specs remain largely under wraps for the time being. Tesla didn’t provide any details on the Robovan’s range, cost, or when it might enter production, but timelines have always been a bit fluid when it comes to Tesla, especially in terms of autonomous driving.
In 2019, Musk famously declared that the company would put one million autonomous robotaxis on the road by the end of 2020, but that date has long come and gone. Meanwhile, Tesla is facing competition in the robotaxi arena. Google’s Waymo is currently on its sixth generation of self-driving vehicles, with over 700 autonomous taxis logging 100,000 rides per week, although its vehicles only operate in select parts of Phoenix, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Austin. GM was also operating its own Cruise robotaxis in many of the same cities before getting its driverless taxi operation license yanked in late 2023 due to safety concerns, and eventually pulling the plug on the whole operation in December 2024.
A Modern Mechanical Turk?
The We, Robot event will probably be seen as a mixed success from a marketing perspective. While the soiree did serve as the debut for Tesla’s new Cybercab and Robovan, it was the “autonomous” Tesla Optimus robot that really dominated the headlines. The robot, which is slated for a 2026 release, will reportedly cost $20,000 to $30,000, according to Musk. The humanoid machines worked the crowd as part of the night’s entertainment, showcasing Tesla’s progress in the emerging field of personal robotics by serving drinks, handing out gift bags, and performing a choreographed dance to Haddaway’s 1993 Eurodance hit “What Is Love.” It was an impressive sight, with over a dozen Tesla Bots chatting up analysts and investors and nimbly moving through the crowd, but it all turned out to be something of a mirage. As social media posts began to emerge from We, Robot, it soon became clear that the Tesla Bot’s fluidity and conversational skills relied on a little human assistance.
Shortly after the event, Optimus program leader Milan Kovac admitted that the bots were being remotely controlled by Tesla employees who could guide the machines from a distance. “Of course [they] were human assisted to some extent,” said Kovacs, who added that the Tesla Bots were primarily used to showcase Tesla’s “vision of an amazing future.” Some We, Robot guests said that they were informed of the remote control approach, while others were caught entirely off-guard. The Tesla Bots were never advertised as 100-percent autonomous, A.I.-powered androids, but it is easy to see why some attendees felt a little misled by the night’s proceedings. First off, remote operation—a.k.a. teleoperation—has been around since as early as the 1940s. Optimus is certainly a lot more sophisticated than the remotely-operated machines of old, but its appearance at the We, Robot could be seen as a sort of cheap party trick akin to the chess-playing Mechanical Turk of the late 1700s.
Tesla has routinely overpromised and undelivered, and while its Autopilot semi-autonomous driving system was one of the industry’s first, it hasn’t exactly kept pace with established brands as the technology continues to develop. Autopilot scored a 61/100 in a 2023 review of current assisted driving systems by Consumer Reports, placing alongside Nissan/Infiniti, Volkswagen/Audi, Lucid, and Rivian’s driving systems tight towards the middle of the pack—although the publication did not test Tesla’s more advanced FSD system. Throw in a full slate of Tesla-related crashes sometimes attributed to the brand’s driver-assist technology, including 13 fatal incidents, and it’s easy to see why some were a little unnerved about the faux-autonomy of the event’s Tesla Bots.
Innovation has long been Tesla’s unique value proposition, but faking futurism—or at least being less than upfront about the full functionality of the Optimus bot—risks marring the automaker’s reputation in the name of a few viral clips on social media. Personal robots are undoubtedly part of humanity’s future, and Tesla would be well-positioned to be a leader in the segment given its expertise and manufacturing capabilities, but the Optimus bot’s debut might have been just a little premature.
A New Kind of Auto Show
With the We, Robot event, Tesla accomplished just what it set out to do. The EV brand was able to generate plenty of clicks and get its new self-driving vehicles in front of a lot of eyes, but the public has largely learned to take Tesla’s plans with a grain of salt. There’s no denying that the company has become the undisputed leader in the EV segment and, post-2024 election, is now worth more than GM, Ford, Toyota, and other car companies combined, but only time will tell if the Cybercab, Robovan, and Optimus can live up to the hype. Tesla has outlined a bold vision for the future of personal transportation, giving drivers the potential to get into the lucrative rideshare industry without logging any hours behind the wheel, but whether it competes with the current fleet of self-driving vehicles from the likes of Google remains to be seen. At the end of the day, it’s probably best to look at the We, Robot event like any auto show where brands shoot for the stars, show us what’s possible, and then deliver something inspired by, if not entirely faithful to, the concept designs somewhere down the road.
