Tesla quietly removed the option of full autopilot

In the summer on Habré was published information that Tesla Inc plans to bring its technology Autopilot to perfection. The electric cars of the company Ilona Mask with the integrated autopilot technology of this class would become, in fact, electric robo mobiles. Previously, Autopilot was positioned Tesla Inc only as an assistant driver.

This is a package of options Full Self-Driving Capability, for which customers are supposed to pay, and quite a lot - about three thousand US dollars. The option was added to the site, where electric vehicle buyers could choose it as an attachment to their electric car. But the other day the function was removed from the package of available offers.

Earlier it was reported that for Tesla, the very fact that the Autopilot program, after so many years, finally becomes an autopilot, is beginning to justify its name, which previously did not quite correspond to reality. But now it is not clear whether the promise will be realized in the near future, postponed it indefinitely, or whether the fully independent autopilot will never appear.

The option was removed shortly after Tesla added the most inexpensive version of its budget electric Tesla Model 3 to the list of models. This is not the version that many fans of the company's products are waiting for, at a price of $ 35,000, but the price tag is already close to the desired : only $ 45,000. It is extremely inexpensive if you remember the price of other models of the company's cars.


The model received only rear-wheel drive, less capacious battery, plus a few more restrictions. Nevertheless, it is still a high-class electric vehicle from Tesla, which is capable of much at a much lower price than usual.

As for the most inexpensive option, which Ilon Musk regularly recalls, it is now unclear whether the buyers will receive it. The fact is that just a week ago, Tesla stated that it could not guarantee the shipment of orders for the Tesla Model 3 version for $ 45,000, made after October 15, before the beginning of the next year. Delivery of new models of the middle class will take from 6 to 10 weeks. There is no need to talk about less expensive models - it’s known that they are still unprofitable for Tesla, so the company will be in the last place to fulfill orders for them.



Moreover, this very basic model is still absent in the selection menu on the site.

Nevertheless, the company still little by little fulfills its promises made earlier in relation to the production volumes of electric vehicles. So, most recently Tesla set a new record, which cannot be called accidental: in the penultimate week of September this year, Tesla was able to produce 6,700 electric vehicles. In just the last two days of the record week, the company’s factory produced 2,300 electric vehicles of various models.

For the company, a gradual increase in production is a matter of life and death. The fact is that Tesla is unprofitable for many years. This year, the company showed record losses (although profits were also record). The final goal - raising the production volume of the Tesla Model 3 to 50-55 thousand per month should be completed before the end of the year, and until 2019 only 2.5 months remain. In general, over the past four months, the company has been able to increase production to 64,300 electric vehicles.

Whatever it was, investors see that the company is gradually making a profit, which means an increase in its attractiveness from the market. All previous years were unprofitable for Tesla, now, as far as can be judged, there is a white line and at the same time a new stage of development.

However, competitors are not sleeping either - for example, a little-known earlier startup Lucid Motors received more than $ 1 billion from investors. Investments were provided by the sovereign fund of Saudi Arabia. And just this startup (and he already has a fully working prototype of an electric vehicle) is going to provide buyers with the full autopilot function. So Ilona Mask is to hurry with both the development of Autopilot, its fully functional version, and the provision of low-cost (relatively electric vehicles) to customers.