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I think at an even smaller scope than robotaxis, having a really convincing level 4 driver assist (dare I say "full self driving" mode) for general consumer veh

I think at an even smaller scope than robotaxis, having a really convincing level 4 driver assist (dare I say "full self driving" mode) for general consumer vehicles is a decent value proposition. Both for prospective new car buyers and existing owners. EV adoption has still not reached saturation, so giving some compelling reason to buy a Tesla over another car is pretty big. After a car rolls off the lot its hard to make money on it. Tesla is in a position to actually make money off this, provided their FSD offering is compelling enough. You can extract decently high margin recurring revenue from potential FSD subscriptions. And despite their shortcomings, I think they are probably the closest auto OEM to making it happen, and they are clearly taking things pretty seriously (multi billion dollar GPU clusters, paying top dollar for talent, having a massive data edge, etc). I think Waymo is the superior technology as of now, but in the short - medium term, having a compelling FSD product on a consumer car will probably benefit Tesla quite a lot. I'm not too sure how compelling a fully car-less (i.e people only commute via some company's robotaxi fleet) future is in the medium term though, and its business viability, but it seems like a not-unreasonable north star to work towards.

beAbU 2y ago
Do you think that there exists a big-enough market of consumers who will happily pay a recurring subscription for FSD-esque features in their car? What would be the price point of such a subscription? I struggle to think of a cost that strikes the balance between value for money and me being suspicious of the quality of the service I'm getting. 100s of dollars could easily double or triple the monthly lease/loan which will directly impact the value-prop math we do do in our heads when buying a car. Tens of dollars will immediately make me suspicious of the quality of the service I'm getting. I'm not so sure about any of this. My feeling is that the majority of consumers will not opt of such a subscription, especially if it's something "I can just do myself for free" (drive my car). I have no data to back this feeling though, so I'm curious to know what others think.
- PittleyDunkin 2y ago
  What do you even subscribe to? Is the alleged self driving run by a data center somewhere?
  - beAbU 2y ago
    That was going to be my follow on question. Presumably the answer is a bunch of tele-operators in a 3rd world country, based on this article.

beAbU 2y ago

Do you think that there exists a big-enough market of consumers who will happily pay a recurring subscription for FSD-esque features in their car? What would be the price point of such a subscription? I struggle to think of a cost that strikes the balance between value for money and me being suspicious of the quality of the service I'm getting. 100s of dollars could easily double or triple the monthly lease/loan which will directly impact the value-prop math we do do in our heads when buying a car. Tens of dollars will immediately make me suspicious of the quality of the service I'm getting. I'm not so sure about any of this. My feeling is that the majority of consumers will not opt of such a subscription, especially if it's something "I can just do myself for free" (drive my car). I have no data to back this feeling though, so I'm curious to know what others think.

PittleyDunkin 2y ago
What do you even subscribe to? Is the alleged self driving run by a data center somewhere?
- beAbU 2y ago
  That was going to be my follow on question. Presumably the answer is a bunch of tele-operators in a 3rd world country, based on this article.