Tesla's Robotaxi Pilot: The $4.20 Ride

E73 TESLA'S ROBOTAXI PILOT_ THE $4.20 RIDE

Transcript

Dalton Anderson (00:01.39) Welcome to Bench Step Podcast where we discuss entrepreneurship, industry trends, and the occasional book review. You'll never hear me coming, though I don't hide. What am I?

an EV. Today we're going to discussing the Robo taxi event or the rollout in Austin. And I had a riddle as my intro. It's a bit odd, but I've been sick lately and I've been watching some detective shows. Department Q is, I watched all seasons. Pretty good. If you're into that kind of stuff.

And yeah, so that sure doesn't necessarily have a lot of riddles, but they'll be in a detective looking for clues, you know, gets you in that mindset. Like, what about a riddle? You know? So today we're going to be discussing the episode about EVs and the robo taxi launch. And just to be

super fair to everyone. This was originally announced in plan for, I think it was supposed to be in 2020. Your Tesla will drive itself in 2020. There's still a lot going on in 2020. Like I was in high school in 2020 and

I was also in like a financial like stock class when I was in college in my senior year, like one of the capstones where you have to like, you know, they give you

Dalton Anderson (01:53.038) I don't know. You have to do like technical and fundamental analysis and blah, blah. And the one thing that the professor always hated was Tesla. He was like, I think it was a Russian woman. And then there was like an American man and the Russian woman was like, I just, can't do the Russian accent, but like she's like, I don't understand the why, why? And then the.

American dude was just like...

This doesn't make any sense. These are crazies running the market. Back in my day. anyways, fast forward to now, five years later, we are finally at a point where we have a pilot program.

running in Austin. And so it's a pilot program. It's not full self-driving. It's level four self-driving or level four autonomous driving, sorry. And it's a little full or not full self-driving because it's tele-operated. So there's people constantly monitoring the cars, which I think

Let's be realistic here, right? Like you're the government, you're the governor or something like that. And, or you're in some kind of audio.

Dalton Anderson (03:30.798) some kind of department where you make approvals on your, I think it's auto and transportation. I don't know what the department is. I probably should know, it's on my head. But the transportation department, the transportation department, the person running that, someone comes to you and you're like running this department for the state or your area. And I'm like, Hey man, I got this great idea. I'm to have the cars drive themselves.

And then the first question, like even if you were okay with the idea, the first question you would get would be from, from leaders, other leaders. Okay. So what happens when it makes a mistake? No one's perfect nor, nor algorithms. Who's going to help correct it? Who's liable and opens up all these questions.

So I struggle. I struggle with the idea that Tesla is going to become full self-driving in the environment that it is now.

And like who, who, who is a part of that liability? Like if I had my Tesla drive itself, it made a mistake, caused a crash. Everyone else in the crash, either if it's multiple parties or one party that.

Dalton Anderson (05:06.664) None of them were autonomous. It was just me. My car was autonomous. There's a crash. Is it my... Do I have fiscal responsibility and liability on what my car did? I have no control over what the car does. Like, who pays for that? Like, is that an insurance policy that Tesla has? Do you ensure you're autonomous, Tesla?

Plus you ensure your Tesla that you drive or do you get like some kind of umbrella auto policy for your autonomous driving stuff that the Tesla does or.

Yeah, it just doesn't make much sense. they're saying it's level four, autonomous, because it's tele-operated or can be tele-operated. So there's a back door where people are constantly monitoring it. And if the Tesla looks like it's doing something wrong, then somebody will intervene. And people have to intervene all the time. I think what they're saying is like once every 10,000 miles, there's an intervention.

And then other reports are saying 444 miles. So it's a big Delta. So I'm not sure like what, which one is true or not. Like they just started it. It's been a couple of days. So, but that's a, that's a pretty big difference. It's not like, Oh, you know, 500 to 444. You're splitting straws at that point, but

444 to 10,000 is substantial. And maybe there was a tight bill in the report and they put an extra zero and they meant to put a thousand. I have no idea, but I'm pretty sure people proofread those things. Or at least they should, right? I don't know. Not my shop.

Dalton Anderson (07:07.628) So now that you have the background, right? Like the original is as promised in 2020. There's just been an amazing hype train that has consistently.

I think the hype train for Tesla is like there's these massive promises and they're not delivered on time, but historically they've been delivered. And I think people give leeway, but five years is a long time. we're in June, 2025.

The quote was 1 million robo taxis by 2020. Sleep while your Tesla drives you.

Dalton Anderson (07:58.656) It obviously didn't go as planned and they announced a Robo cab or I think it's called the cyber cab, cyber cab vehicle. That vehicle is supposed to be like the fleet vehicle and currently they're using.

They're using Model Wise to conduct their pilot program. So they're using 10 vehicles on the South Congress of Austin. And there's a lot of limitations, right? So they're using only 10 vehicles. The program was invite only. And

there is tele-operating person that's monitoring every ride. There is a limitation on where you can go. You can't go to complex intersections. You can't operate during certain hours. You can't go to the airport. And so basically like any complex, traffic navigation, they have opted out of that, which makes sense. The PR of

of the Tesla messing up would be pretty big because everyone wants, I don't know, I'm not going say everybody, but I think there's a lot of people that love to see people fail, right? And I don't think Elon is the most favorited person right now at the moment. So I'm pretty sure that he'd get a lot of coverage for any mistakes that his Tesla's

So the program was invite only. They're avoiding complex intersections, any weather events, and then they have teleoperation with live remote operators if needed. So it's not truly driverless. It's not full self-driving because the definition of full self-driving is that it is completely autonomous and it makes all decisions by itself and it doesn't have anybody like.

Dalton Anderson (10:10.094) doesn't have anybody taking over or like that's, that is the definition. So it's not truly driverless, but something, something to keep in mind. And the fare fee was $4 and 20 cents. He loves a 420 price point or a 69. Like I'm surprised he didn't do

Like he sold quite a bit of items, like 420 bucks, 69 cents is I think what he sold some stuff on the Tesla shop for, or he would sell for like $69. It's just so funny. I think it's hilarious. And sorry about my random coughs. just, didn't have any episodes recorded in the bank, so here I am.

Dalton Anderson (11:06.542) So not truly driverless, five years behind schedule, 420 fare.

Dalton Anderson (11:17.122) Then geo-fenced, limited accessibility.

Dalton Anderson (11:27.502) Hmm. Like it's truly a pilot program, but it's a closed pilot. And so I can't really say it's launched. I'd say that it's being started and look forward to the launch of the product, but it's definitely not launched. It's in a probably, it doesn't even sound like a beta because I guess it could be beta because it's a closed beta, but

and they're on the roads, but there's a lot of limitations on like what rides you can take, right?

can't take it during bad weather. You can't take it at night. You can't take to the airport. You can't go through tough intersections. So I, I don't think it's close to launched. Like that's, that's my opinion. You can feel differently. That's fine. But I mean, that's, that's the facts. One thing I thought that was funny was that it asks you for a tip. And if you go to tip afterwards,

when you have your trip, it allows you to tip. And so you press the button to tip and then a pop-up comes up and it's just like a meme, like JK, just joking. No need to tip. And so it's like a Easter egg and they love those Easter eggs. And I think that's what makes the brand a little bit unique compared to other brands. They put Easter eggs in their software.

So.

Dalton Anderson (13:05.39) Yeah, this is what I mentioned earlier. So it says that Tesla, Tesla sites, internal claims of 10,000 miles per intervention. Independent data suggests 444 miles per intervention.

Dalton Anderson (13:24.458) It's like, I don't even know how to explain like how, did two different studies have way, way different results. And so you also have to also, if you're, you're citing your own source, like your own company, that source is definitely biased. Like I'm, if I'm my own company and I'm publicly traded, I mean, this is, this is not something I would do though. I'm just pointing that out.

The data is what it is. shouldn't use the data to tell a different story. That would be wrong. But I could see how if you were at Tesla and you're like, hmm, you know, if I change some stuff out, if I limit to our current rollout plan, if I take the times down and just use, you know, these operating times and then I avoid these like complex intersections and these other things.

Hey, I can get us to 10, one incident every 10,000 miles. And I think that's what they did because if you do cut the data in a certain way and then you roll out with that data, like, okay, like your rollout limitations in Austin match your data that you're citing, then that does make sense. But I think the other folks are looking at it like more of a open ended question.

and putting less limitations and assumptions on it because it's supposed to be full self-driving.

I don't know.

Dalton Anderson (15:03.894) So people think that it's cool. I mean, there's definitely skeptics. I mean, why would you not be skeptical? think Waymo and Tesla are. I'm glad that Tesla's entered the race of this autonomous vehicles and this fleet thing. Waymo is super cool. I've never been able to do it, but I've heard awesome things and they're having their own struggles there in California with the riots and stuff.

but and like nine of their Waymo's got burnt to crisp. So I think that was like half their fleet, unfortunately, cause the cars are really expensive and they're still in like a kind of a beta program.

Dalton Anderson (15:48.462) But, man, sorry.

Texas is supportive, obviously. They want one of their biggest companies and folks and one of the richest people in the world to be happy with the regulatory environment. I, Tesla, not Tesla, Texas has done a great job attracting companies from other states with tougher regulatory environments, especially California or North.

and or citizens and that has opened the door for a lot of opportunities for companies to move their headquarters there and or start a company there versus starting it somewhere else. So

Obviously, Tesla and Texas are going to have probably a pretty tight relationship simply because of, Tesla, SpaceX, all these companies. I mean, just from Tesla and space. mean, SpaceX has their own municipality now. So, yeah, they're going to. They're going to they're going to be pretty receptive to these ass. So I don't know.

I don't know how far they're going to be able to push it, but we're still seeing quite a bit of resistance on like a full launch.

Dalton Anderson (17:25.334) Speaking of launches, the cyber cab is supposed to launch.

2026. Hopefully that launches on time. And then the next thing is there's supposed to be a way for you to opt in your Tesla to the Tesla driving network or something like that. And you'll be able to get passive income and you'll your Tesla will work for you while you're sleeping or when you don't need your car because you don't really need your car all day.

you go to work, go from work, or you go to the store, you go home, or if you work from home, you don't really need your car that much.

Dalton Anderson (18:08.226) But the issue with that is the vehicles aren't built to be fleet vehicles. Like there's a big difference between cars that are used for taxi services or these ride services and

ones that aren't and your Tesla that you've purchased and you've been using, I think it's gonna get tore up with just all these random people like leaving trash, spilling stuff, doing things like no supervision. Like how do you know who did what? Because you don't. I know they have like cameras and stuff in the car to monitor the attention of the driver.

but I'm not necessarily sure that they'll be able to detect all these different damages that are happen while you're driving autonomously and the owner's not there.

Dalton Anderson (19:11.342) So.

Dalton Anderson (19:16.622) The fare was 420. It is going to, I think long, longterm what they want to do is just undercut everybody, a growth growth model. So undercut Lyft, Uber, it'd be Tesla owned versus these owner fleets or private owner fleets. So it'd be Teslas running Teslas. Either the Teslas are owned by Tesla owners or

It is a legitimate commercial fleet owned by Tesla.

Dalton Anderson (19:52.142) I think if you were buying a Tesla, it would be an incentive to get the full self-driving package simply because now you can have your car like pay off your mortgage, like your car, I guess your car loan, if you got a loan, pay off your car loan or whatever it may be. So maybe your monthly payment is much cheaper than it would have been. And

Dalton Anderson (20:24.514) think the key issue is that Waymo is already fully integrated into Uber.

Waymo is already in many cities. so like Waymo has been around for a minute and they've been, they, they've had rides. think one of the key issues is that I think Waymo is very conservative. They are not really hyping much of their product.

And so there's probably so many people in the country that have no idea Waymo even exists. But so many people know that Tesla did this pilot over the weekend. I bet more people know that Tesla did this pilot in Austin over the weekend. Then people know that Waymo is in many cities and integrated with Uber and you can take it. No problem. With less, with less.

Dalton Anderson (21:33.186) with less limitations and issues.

but just they don't have the hype on their product. And even though they're first to market, they've got no hype. I mean, you can overhype things for sure, right? But unless you're in tech or techie, I don't think people really know that much about it. But 100 % people know about Tesla's rollout this week.

And I think that's a big issue. How I don't think Waymo is going to fix that. But concerning that, if Tesla is able to ramp up their autonomous.

program in their fleet.

Dalton Anderson (22:35.5) I think Waymo kind of gets forgotten about.

Dalton Anderson (22:41.594) And maybe that Uber is going to do all the hard marketing for them. Uber was pretty good at marketing. So maybe Uber does the marketing for Waymo and Waymo is kind of the back office tech that supports

Dalton Anderson (23:02.24) Uber's efficiency. And if that is the case, then maybe Waymo and Uber have to have some kind of equity stake in each other. Otherwise it doesn't really make much sense. So.

Dalton Anderson (23:18.808) But that was that was what I thought about the whole situation is that it's a bit disappointing that we find ourselves in this this spot where there's a tech technology that's been around for a minute and not that much hype. And then there's just a company that is able to hype.

their product and their offerings so much better than potentially a superior technology or technology just as good. But that's the free market. I just wish that Waymo would better compete with their...

outreach. Because if so, it's a really fun environment for the customer. You really just want more competition and more people to perceive that there is competition. And if that is the case, then it pushes these companies much further, much faster, and they're required to build a much better product and offer. And so you always want to have competition. If you don't, that's bad sign.

don't necessarily think that.

enough people know that there's Waymo. And if they did, then it pushed Waymo and Tesla much harder. So, and that's a common theme that I've had over the last couple of episodes. So, but of course, thanks for bearing. Thanks for listening in. Sorry. Thanks for listening in. And I hope that you have a wonderful day wherever you are in this world.

Dalton Anderson (25:05.464) Good evening. Good afternoon. Good morning. Thanks for listening. Hope you listening again next week. Sorry, I feeling too well. Hopefully I'll record some episodes and get them back in the bank just in case things like this happen and I become sick, but I'll be working on my recovery. So the next episode I'll be well. See ya. Goodbye.