Watch Tesla’s Humanoid Robots Walk Into the Future
Tesla is showing off how well its Optimus robots can walk in a new video showcasing their movements. The video highlights advances made in the nearly two years since CEO Elon Musk vowed to create the humanoid robots and brought a human in a robot suit onstage to kick off the project.
Optimus Move
Musk introduced the video to Tesla shareholders at a meeting last week, demonstrating a variety of Optimus droids, each with its own capabilities. Musk, who referred to them as “companions,” highlighted how the robots can now walk, pick things up, and use Tesla tools. In the video, you can see the robots walk and jump seemingly nearly as smoothly as a human. The video also seeks to point out the level of control the robots have over their movement, with the rubber foot of one robot stepping on but not breaking an egg. The robots move and navigate using AUtopilito, the same software that Tesla’s self-driving cars employ. The robots are also capable of directly learning from humans, mimicking the way operators in motion-tracking suits and head-mounted cameras perform. The ultimate goal, according to Musk, is to use robots when a job is unsafe or too repetitive for human workers, and they aren’t supposed to beat out humans for jobs. Musk predicts the robots will come to the market in the next five years and cost under $20,000.
“As full self-driving gets closer and closer to generalized real-world AI, that same software is transferrable to a humanoid robot,” Musk said in his presentation. “My prediction is that the majority of Tesla’s long-term value will be Optimus. And I am very confident in that prediction.”
Although engineers have only been working on Optimus for around a year, Musk expects it will be available in three to five years and could cost less than $20,000. He added that the bot could become more integral to the company than EVs. “My prediction is that the majority of Tesla’s long-term value will be Optimus, and that prediction I’m very confident of,” Musk said.
The humanoid robot promised last year by Tesla CEO Elon Musk made its appearance this week at Tesla AI Day 2022. Announcing that “we’ve come a long way,” Musk welcomed the robot as it shuffled onto the stage, a far cry from the human in a robot suit last year, though not quite the Optimus robot Musk promised was on its way.
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