On October 10, billionaire Elon Musk’s Tesla will launch its self-driving taxi. Notably, he has rented the entire land of Warner Bros. Studios – one of the world’s largest film and television production companies – to host the event.
This will be the first new product revealed since he introduced the Optimus robot prototype two years ago. “This will be an event that will go down in history,” he shared on social network X.
Elon Musk faces a major challenge: convincing investors that Tesla is not just a carmaker, but a leading technology company. The company’s stock now depends on that ability.
Once a symbol of innovation in the auto industry, Tesla now faces the risk of losing its position if it fails to differentiate itself. The upcoming Robotaxi Day may be Elon Musk’s last chance to prove that Tesla is still ahead in the race for auto technology and not fading into oblivion.
Musk’s vision was integral to Tesla’s rise. He pioneered electric vehicles at a time when few believed they could succeed in the United States. Musk also convinced investors that Tesla was not just about making cars, but about developing a complete ecosystem that offered everything from self-driving technology to solar panels and energy storage systems. In his role as the “Steve Jobs of the auto industry,” Musk turned Tesla into a trillion-dollar company by 2021, a year ahead of Nvidia.
He calls it a historic moment because the day these autonomous taxis are introduced will create an overnight surge in asset value as millions of Teslas across the US can be taught to drive unattended with the push of a download button. Once activated, they can earn their owners $30,000 in taxi rides a year while they eat, sleep, or work, a figure Tesla quoted in April 2019, which would be equivalent to $37,000 today.
Musk estimates the technology is worth as much as $5 trillion to investors, a sum that would make Tesla the world’s most valuable company by far.