Tesla has publicly He put his future on his robotaxia. Now the company is planning to launch a public car service in the San Francisco Bay. Tesla calls this “Robotaksi” service, but this one will have to utilize cars with human drivers.
It seems that the plan places the manufacturer of electric cars in obscure legal waters in the USA with the most strictly regulated industry of autonomous vehicles in the country – and where Tesla is already the defendant about the misleading language around the driver’s assistance technology.
On Friday, a spokesman for the California Commission for Public Users, which regulates travel and taxi services in this state, said that Tesla informed the agency on Thursday that he was planning to expand taxi services for friends and family family and “choose” society members. Technically, Tesla is legally to launch this type of service in California: in March she obtained the permission of the “Party Transport Card” to take Tesla employees on initial trips with the driver behind the wheel. But Tesla is NO Legally allowed to serve the autonomous service based on vehicles.
“Tesla cannot test or transport societies (paid or free) in [autonomous vehicle] With a driver or without “, spokesman for CPUC Terry Prosper in an e-mail.” Tesla can transport society (paid or free) in[autonomous vehicle]who of course would have a driver. “
Business Insider First reported The fact that Tesla told employees that she was planning to launch the “Robotaksi” service in Bay Area on Friday.
In Wednesday’s conversation with earnings with investors, the Vice President of Tesla Donor Ai Ai Aishok Elluswama said that Tesla “works with the government to obtain consent” to launch in Bay Area. “Meanwhile, we will launch a service with a person in the driver’s place to speed up, waiting for regulatory approval,” he said.
However, Tesla, legally, cannot currently start any service with autonomous vehicles, which means that “a person in the driver’s seat” will have to be a driver. Tesla has no permission to pilot autonomous vehicle technology, even with a safety driver, Prosper says: “So he can’t use the driver [autonomous vehicle] in passenger service. “
Tesla seems to speak here on both sides of the mouth. The company seems to be insisting on regulatory bodies that it simply supports the taxi service in California, while suggesting to shareholders and Wall Street that the modern taxi service uses “robotaxia” and is autonomous. It seems that the manufacturer’s manufacturer used this technique. This is Currently in the administrative court With the state of California, in connection with the allegations that Tesla has been misleading consumers for years, using a language such as “autopilot” and “full self -consumption” to sell technology that cannot be driven, but must be supervised by a human driver.
“Tesla could not have it both ways,” says Philip Koopman, Professor Carnegie Mellon University, who studies the safety of autonomous vehicles. The automaker “gives California more ammunition regarding false advertising, insisting that it is Robotaksi when they tell regulatory authorities that it is not really.”