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DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Elon Musk said that he expects hundreds of thousands of self-driving Teslas will be on the road requiring no human intervention by the end of next year and that he is committed to staying as CEO of the company for at least another five years.
The billionaire also said in a pair of interviews on Tuesday that he has no regrets about leading the job-slashing Department of Government Efficiency under the Trump administration. He downplayed any damage to the Tesla brand from that role, saying demand for Teslas has experienced a “major rebound." That's potentially a big development given that the latest public sales figures from Europe and U.S. show steep declines in sales for several months running.
“We'll probably have hundreds of thousands, if not over a million, Teslas doing self-driving in the U.S.,” Musk said in an CNBC interview Tuesday, adding that passengers won't need to pay attention to the road. “Like you're asleep and you wake up at your destination.”
His comment about sticking around as CEO was made earlier in the day at the Qatar Economic Forum hosted by Bloomberg.
Musk has been promising fully autonomous, self-driving vehicles “next year” for a decade but the pressure is on now as Tesla begins a test run of its self-driving taxi service in Austin, Texas, next month.
“This is a watershed time for Tesla, and Musk is doubling down on these numbers,” said Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives. “These are pretty bullish forecasts.”
Tesla's stock closed Tuesday up nearly 1% to $345. After a steep fall this year, the stock is up more than 50% in little over a month as investors have cheered Musk's decision to scale back his time in Washington and spend more time running the company.
Musk also gave new details about the Austin service, saying Tesla taxis will be remotely monitored at first and “geofenced” to certain areas of the city deemed the safest to navigate. He told CNBC that he expected to initially run 10 or so taxis, increase that number rapidly and start offering the service in Los Angeles, San Antonio, San Francisco and other cities.
Federal safety regulators recently asked Tesla to explain how its driverless taxis will operate safely in Austin when there is fog, sun glare, rain and other low-visibility conditions that have been tied to accidents involving the company’s driver-assistance software. However, federal regulators have limited powers over new Tesla taxis that operate without a steering wheel or brake pedals because there are no national regulations on self-driving technology.