robotaxi

Three crashes in the first day? Tesla’s robotaxi test in Austin.

Cars, FSD, robotaxi, Tesla / Mike M. / September 22, 2025

These days, Austin, Texas feels like ground zero for autonomous cars. Although California was the early test bed for autonomous driving tech, the much more permissive regulatory environment in the Lone Star State, plus lots of wide, straight roads and mostly good weather, ticked enough boxes to see companies like Waymo and Zoox set up shop there. And earlier this summer, Tesla added itself to the list. Except things haven’t exactly gone well.

According to Tesla’s crash reports, spotted by Brad Templeton over at Forbes, the automaker experienced not one but three crashes, all apparently on its first day of testing on July 1. And as we learned from Tesla CEO Elon Musk later in July during the (not-great) quarterly earnings call, by that time, Tesla had logged a mere 7,000 miles in testing.

By contrast, Waymo’s crash rate is more than two orders of magnitude lower, with 60 crashes logged over 50 million miles of driving. (Waymo has now logged more than 96 million miles.)

Two of the three Tesla crashes involved another car rear-ending the Model Y, and at least one of these crashes was almost certainly not the Tesla’s fault. But the third crash saw a Model Y—with the required safety operator on board—collide with a stationary object at low speed, resulting in a minor injury. Templeton also notes that there was a fourth crash that occurred in a parking lot and therefore wasn’t reported. Sadly, most of the details in the crash reports have been redacted by Tesla.

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Tesla launches robotaxi service in Austin

austin, Cars, elon musk, robotaxi, robotaxis, syndication, Tesla / Beth Washington / June 23, 2025

Tesla’s robotaxi service, touted by Elon Musk as the future of his flagging electric-car maker, launched in the company’s home city of Austin, Texas, on Sunday with about 10 vehicles and a human safety driver on board amid regulatory scrutiny of its self-driving technology.

Shares in Tesla have risen about 50 percent from this year’s low in early April, with investors hopeful the autonomous ride-hailing service will help revive a company that has suffered declining sales and a consumer backlash against Musk’s political activism.

Despite the hype surrounding Tesla’s robotaxi, the launch—with a company employee seated in the passenger side for safety while leaving the driver’s seat empty—was low-key, and the initial service was open only to a select group of social media influencers.

Shortly before the launch, Musk said on social media that the robotaxi service would begin “with customers paying a $4.20 flat fee.”

According to Musk, who has stepped back from his US government role to focus on the electric-car maker and the robotaxi, the self-driving Tesla Model Y vehicles will only operate in limited areas, avoid challenging intersections, and have teleoperators who can intervene if problems arise.

The limited launch comes as the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration continues to carry out multiple investigations into Musk’s claims about the capabilities of Tesla’s autopilot and “full self-driving” systems. Despite its name, the full self-driving system still requires humans to sit in the driver’s seat and pay full attention—unlike Google’s Waymo taxis.

The NHTSA wrote a letter in early May seeking additional information about technologies that would be used in Tesla’s robotaxi service. The regulator said it had received Tesla’s response and was reviewing its content.

Musk said in a social media post this month that the company was being “super paranoid” about safety. But he has also claimed there would be 1,000 robotaxis “in a few months,” and that the service would expand to cities such as San Francisco and Los Angeles.

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USPTO refuses Tesla Robotaxi trademark as “merely descriptive”

Cars, cybercab, robotaxi, Tesla, USPTO / Mike M. / May 8, 2025

“We are an AI, robotics company,” Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced last April. Despite the fact that the company’s revenues are overwhelmingly derived from selling new electric vehicles, such prosaic activities hold no luster for the boss. Instead, Tesla’s future, according to Musk, depends upon a (claimed) sub-$30,000 driverless two-seater, revealed to the world last October in a staged demonstration on a film set. But Musk’s plans just hit a snag: The company must find some new names.

As spotted by Sean O’Kane at TechCrunch, the United States Patent and Trademark Office has informed Tesla that it will not be allowed to trademark the word “robotaxi” to describe the vehicle. According to the USPTO, the term is far too generic. Indeed, a Google n-gram search shows a steady growth in the use of “robotaxi” starting more than a decade ago.

According to the USPTO, the term is merely descriptive. The agency cites evidence from Wikipedia, The Verge, and the Amazon-backed autonomous vehicle startup Zoox in its denial of Tesla’s trademark application.

A Tesla Cybercab prototype at a Tesla store in San Jose, California, US, on Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2024. Tesla CEO Elon Musk said the robotaxi, which has no steering wheel or pedals, could cost less than $30,000 and — Maybe they should just have called it the Teslapod. Credit: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Tesla could challenge this decision, but it would have to show the USPTO all the product’s marketing materials, brochures, and manuals that intend to use the name. If those aren’t available, Tesla must explain to the patent and trademark office’s satisfaction how this product will differ from others, with detailed specifics, not generalities. Tesla must also explain whether the car features robotic systems and whether any of Tesla’s competitors use “robo,” “robot,” or “robotic” to describe their own goods and services—the fact that Zoox refers to its autonomous pods as robotaxis will be very inconvenient for Tesla.

It’s not the first time that Tesla has been accused of a lack of originality. Alcon Entertainment sued Warner Brothers and Tesla after it refused them permission and adamantly objected to WB’s and Tesla’s attempt to link the vehicle with vehicles seen in Blade Runner 2049. Although Tesla attempted to get the case dismissed, in April, the court ordered the parties to enter into mediation.

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