Tesla officially starts autonomous ‘testing’ phase in Austin days before planned launch

Tesla has officially entered the autonomous vehicle ‘testing’ phase in Austin, Texas days before its planned launch of a commercial service.

For months, Tesla has been discussing the launch of a self-driving ride-hailing fleet in June in Austin, Texas.

As we previously reported, the move is a major shift from Tesla’s long promise to enable unsupervised self-driving capabilities in millions of vehicles sold since 2016.

Instead, Tesla now plans to operate its own small internal fleet of vehicles with dedicated software optimized for a geo-fenced area of Austin and supported by “plenty of teleoperation.”

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Tesla CEO Elon Musk has been talking about launching the paid ride-hailing service to customers in June, but there have been doubts. Musk admitted that Tesla only started testing the system without safety drivers at the end of May.

In comparison, Waymo tested its system, which was already in operation driverless in other cities, for 6 months with safety drivers and 6 months without safety drivers before launching its service in Austin earlier this year.

Tesla was also never on the list of ‘Known AV Operators in Austin‘ on the city’s official website.

As of today, it is now the case. Tesla has been added to the list in the “testing phase”:

Waymo is still the only company listed as being in the “deployment” phase.

It’s unclear if the website is lagging behind the test programs or if Tesla has only now officially started its self-driving testing in the city.

In the past, Tesla has managed to get around self-driving test reporting by claiming that its system is a level ADAS system and not actual “self-driving” – leaving the person in the driver’s seat responsible for the vehicle at all times.

Tesla vehicles with drivers in the driver’s seat and manufacturer plates have been spotted driving around Austin for the past few months.

It was recently reported that Tesla was aiming to launch its commercial autonomous ride-hailing service in Austin on June 12, but it was still a moving target.

Without achieving the deployment phase, Tesla is not going to be able to accept paid rides from customers like Waymo.

Musk has committed several times to launching the service by the end of June.

Electrek’s Take

Again, I’m hoping that Tesla has managed to improve FSD for the geo-fenced location significantly and that it will limit the speed, as the current public version of FSD barely achieves 500 miles between critical disengagements.

Removing the driver could result in some serious accidents.

Teleoperation will also help, but any kind of delay could also be dangerous. It is worrisome.