Tesla Inc. CEO Elon Musk has expressed his primary concern regarding the company’s ambitious Optimus humanoid robot program. Musk’s fear is not about the technical challenges of building the robot, but rather about ensuring he retains strong influence over the future “robot army.”
Technical Challenges of Building Optimus
Difficulty in Creating a Functional Robot
During Tesla’s third-quarter earnings call, Musk explained that while Optimus robots can already walk around the company’s Palo Alto offices, the real challenge lies in creating a robot that is truly functional in the real world.
“Bringing Optimus to market is an incredibly difficult task … It’s not like some walk in the park,”
Musk highlighted the complexity of building a human-like hand and forearm, which he described as harder to engineer than the rest of the robot.
“The human hand is an incredible thing,”
Fingers have different lengths, strengths, and degrees of freedom for a reason. Making the hand and forearm is an incredibly difficult engineering challenge.
Scaling Production Without a Supply Chain
Manufacturing Challenge
Musk also addressed the massive manufacturing challenge of producing millions of Optimus robots. Unlike cars or computers, there is no existing supply chain for humanoid robots, requiring Tesla to produce many components in-house.
“Tesla actually has to be very vertically integrated and manufacture very deep into the supply chain, manufacture the parts internally because there just is no supply chain,”
Musk’s Concern is About Influence, Not Compensation
Control Over the Future Robot Army
The CEO stressed that his main concern isn’t personal profit but control over the future robot army. Musk said he wants to ensure strong influence over how the robots are used, even if he doesn’t hold current control.
“My fundamental concern with regard to how much voting control I have at Tesla is if I go ahead and build this enormous robot army, can I just be ousted at some point in the future?”
“That’s what it comes down to in a nutshell. I don’t feel comfortable wielding that robot army if I don’t have at least a strong influence,”
Tesla’s Q3 Performance
Revenue Beat
Tesla reported third-quarter revenue of $28.10 billion, reflecting a 12% year-over-year increase and surpassing the Street consensus estimate of $26.24 billion. The company’s performance marked its first revenue beat after four consecutive quarters of missing analyst expectations.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Elon Musk’s greatest fear is losing control of Tesla’s Optimus robot army. While the technical challenges of building the robot are significant, Musk’s primary concern is about ensuring he retains strong influence over the future robot army.