Tech

Tesla’s Optimus Bot Makes a Scene at The Robotaxi Event, Robovan Revealed

A bunch of Tesla’s humanoid Optimus robots walked out alongside the reveal of Tesla’s new Robovan vehicle at tonight’s Cybercab event. The robot is also seen in a video doing daily human tasks like bringing in a package from the porch and watering your plants. “The Optimus will walk amongst you,” Tesla CEO Elon Musk says. “You’ll be able to walk right up to them, and they will serve drinks.”

Musk explains it can basically “do anything” and mentions examples like walking your dog, babysitting your kids, and mowing your lawn. He said “it will cost $20,000 to $30,000 long term. I think this will be the biggest product ever of any kind,” Musk says.

After the presentation, livestream footage showed people interacting with Optimus robots at tables and in crowds. Still, the robots weren’t doing much other than waving in the style of Astro Bot. There was a table of drinks — but the Optimus bot was not seen doing more than holding a cup of ice. However, one bot could hand over small gift bags at another table and play rock, paper, scissors with guests. And there was an enclosed gazebo with a bunch of dancing robots inside.

Musk revealed a lighter and faster Gen 2 bot last year. And in an April earnings call, he said Optimus will start performing “useful tasks” by the end of this year and could be sold “externally by the end of next year.” The Tesla bot was not a serious product when Musk first revealed the project in 2021, when a man in a robot suit took the stage to perform a silly dance. But in 2022, the company showed off a crude prototype that gingerly walked onstage.

Musk has loftily promised that Optimus will be a “fundamental transformation for civilization.” And he made bigger ones for the investors: that it’ll bring “two orders of magnitude” of potential improvement of economic output and that it can be “made in very high volume, ultimately millions of units.” Musk said it would cost around “$20,000” and allow for “a future where there is no poverty.”

Terron Gold