Elon Musk unveiled Tesla’s Robovan prototype at the We, Robot event in Los Angeles on Thursday night. Robovan is an electric autonomous vehicle roughly the size of a bus, designed to transport people in high-density areas. According to Musk, it can carry up to 20 people at a time and also transport goods.
“We’re going to build this, and it’s going to look like that,” Musk said Thursday night as the Robovan rolled toward center stage. That’s as much as Musk was willing to say, and we’re not even sure that much is true.
Musk did not say how much the Robovan will cost, how Tesla will produce it, or when it will be released. But it looks pretty cool.
Robovan has a retro-futuristic look that’s somewhere between The Jetsons’ bus and a 1950s toaster. It features silver metal sides with black detailing, a strip of light running parallel to the ground along the side, and a sliding door in the center. The interior has seating and standing space and tinted windows throughout. Because it is self-driving, there is no steering wheel.
“One of the things we want to do is change the face of the roads, and we’ve done that with the Cybertruck,” Musk said. “The future must look like the future.” He said, repeating an old saying:
It looks similar to other purpose-built robotaxi, such as those designed by Zoox and Cruise. Only Tesla’s van is much larger. In China, WeRide has built a similar Robobus.
In other words, the Robovan shown on Thursday is just a prototype. Despite what Musk said, we don’t know what it will actually look like or when it will actually come out.
Tesla kept the design of the vehicle it launched Thursday close to its chest. The only real hint we had was at Tesla’s 2023 Investor Day, where the automaker teased two new vehicles that appear to be designed for mass production. There is currently one small vehicle that appears to be a Cybercab and a larger vehicle that is now available. Most likely Robovan.
The stated goal at the time was to produce 20 million vehicles per year by 2030. That means Tesla will need to increase production and sales by about 15 times starting in 2022.
At Thursday’s event, Musk did not outline plans to build new production facilities or renovate existing facilities to accommodate Cybercab or Robovan. He also predicted that the Cybercab would begin production in 2026 or 2027, but didn’t provide much information about Robovan’s timeline.
