I think Tesla will win the self driving robotaxi race for several reasons. First of all Tesla produces self driving cars today for under 40k vs Waymo's 140k. Second Tesla has shown that they have the capability to build at scale. Third Tesla is using a visual self driving system that I believe will work better given our existing roads are all designed for visual drivers.
"Elon Musk has stated that roads are designed for a visual system—specifically, for human eyes and biological neural networks
. This argument is his justification for Tesla's strategy of relying solely on cameras and artificial intelligence (AI) for its self-driving technology, rather than adding other sensors like lidar or radar.
The "visual roads" argument
- Cameras mimic human eyes: Musk's core premise is that since the entire road system—including signs, lane markings, and traffic signals—was built for human visual processing, a system of cameras and an AI neural network is the most direct way to achieve self-driving.
- Silicon neural nets: In this analogy, the AI neural network acts as the "brain" that interprets the camera data, just as a human brain processes information from the eyes.
- Sensor redundancy is a "fool's errand": Musk has controversially dismissed lidar, a sensor that uses lasers to create a 3D map of the car's surroundings. He argues that the added complexity of fusing data from multiple sensor types can actually increase the risk of confusion and accidents. He once tweeted, "LIDAR is a seductive local maximum. ...the road system was designed to work with biological neural nets & eyes, so a general solution to self-driving necessarily will require silicon neural nets & cameras". "