Tesla Inc. is postponing the planned unveiling of its robotaxi until October to give the groups performing the task more time to build more prototypes, according to other people familiar with the decision.
The roughly two-month delay was communicated internally, said the resources, who requested anonymity because the data had not been publicly announced. The design team this week asked to rework some elements of the car, one of the resources said.
CEO Elon Musk set the Aug. 8 date for the occasion months ago, and optimism over the spectacle contributed to an 11-day winning streak that added more than $257 billion to Tesla’s market capitalization. Inventory closed down 8. 4% on Thursday, its biggest drop since January.
Musk responded to requests for comment.
Shares of upcoming taxi rivals Uber Technologies Inc. and Lyft Inc. rose on the news. Uber’s inventory rose 6. 1% on Thursday. Lyft’s inventories increased 4. 6%.
The idea of creating a self-driving taxi service has been circulating around Tesla for years, dating back at least to when Musk drafted a second “plan” for the company in 2016. The CEO has prioritized the task in recent years. In recent months in relation to the paints of an electric vehicle less expensive than Tesla’s maximum car, the Model 3 sedan.
Read more: Tesla feeds on chaos amid Musk’s Robotaxi dream
Musk talked about Tesla’s paintings of generating autonomous vehicles for more than a decade and convinced consumers to pay thousands of dollars for a set of features that the companies market as Full Self-Driving or FSD. The call is inappropriate: FSD requires constant monitoring and does not make Teslas autonomous, yet Musk and most sensible engineers have been bullish on FSD in recent months as Tesla vehicle sales The company has slowed down.
Tesla delivered 6. 6% fewer cars in the first part of the year, despite adding a new model, the Cybertruck, to its lineup. The automaker also produced 14% fewer cars in the second quarter than a year earlier, to help ease inventory buildup.