Tesla’s reveal of a robotaxi designed as a low-slung, two-seater, sporty coupe - quite the opposite of a typical taxi with room for several passengers and luggage - flummoxed investors and analysts.
But in true Musk style, he skipped over expectations of how a two-seater robotaxi would serve the needs of families headed to a restaurant or to the airport, or if he expected these to appeal only to a niche clientele.
Investors jeered the design and the lack of financial detail, with Tesla stocks tumbling 9% on Wall Street on Friday.
“When you think of a cab, you think of something that’s going to carry more than two people,” said Jonathan Elfalan, vehicle testing director for the automotive website Edmunds.com. “Making this a two-seat-only car is very perplexing.”
To me it makes sense because without the driver, there’s less need to maximize passengers per vehicle. Plus the added weight for the extra, often unused seats is a bigger problem for EVs because of the need to minimize weight (which then requires more heavy batteries). Generally the vast majority of taxi trips are one or two people, so you don’t wanna make them any bigger than necessary. And if there’s 4 people, they can just take 2.
The problem isn’t the number of seats, it’s that there’s no plan for them to become actually self-driving.
EVs really don’t have to minimize weight nearly as much as ICE cars. Regen is really powerful with a large battery and aerodynamics and rolling resistance is king at speed. And larger and heavier batteries are cheaper too.