What about Tesla?
I expect some readers have found this article frustrating because I have barely mentioned Tesla’s Full Self Driving software, which Tesla fans view as the industry leader. This is because I view Tesla as operating in a different market from Waymo and Cruise. Tesla is building a driver-assistance system that is designed to be used only with direct human oversight, while Waymo and Cruise are trying to build cars that can drive entirely on their own.
Of course, that’s not how Tesla fans see it. They expect Full Self Driving technology to continue improving to the point where human supervision becomes unnecessary. At that point, Tesla will supposedly launch a driverless taxi network that competes directly with Waymo and Cruise.
I’m skeptical of this. I’ve watched a bunch of videos of FSD in action in recent days, and it’s still pretty common for drivers to intervene when a car gets into a tricky situation. This suggests that Tesla’s technology is roughly on par with Waymo’s technology circa 2016, a year when Waymo vehicles had a safety-related disengagement once every 5,000 miles.
I think a big reason Tesla fans have a misperception that FSD is ahead of Waymo and Cruise is that Tesla’s FSD operates in more situations, including freeways. But that misunderstands what’s going on. Waymo has been testing its technology on freeways for more than a decade; it has just been doing it exclusively with safety drivers. Tesla only tests its vehicles with a driver behind the wheel, so of course FSD is able to go on the freeway, too. But this isn’t evidence of Tesla’s superior performance on freeways; it just reflects Waymo’s more cautious approach and different business model.
It also seems implausible that Tesla will just flip a switch one day and allow its vehicles to operate driverlessly everywhere. More likely, the company will want to follow in Waymo’s footsteps and test out driverless functionality in lower-risk areas first, then gradually expand to riskier environments. This process has taken Waymo six years so far, and while Tesla might be able to do it faster, I doubt it will be that much faster.
One reason is that there are some problems that a company will only encounter once it begins testing fully driverless operations. Waymo's and Cruise’s problems with fire hoses and caution tape are a good example. A human driver would disengage FSD long before it got into situations like that, which means Tesla would be unlikely to have the training data necessary to train its cars to handle it properly.
Tesla also isn’t laying the necessary groundwork to operate a driverless taxi service. Taxi companies need to develop relationships with taxi regulators, police and firefighters, and other officials in cities where they operate. They also need teams of drivers and mechanics in each city to respond when a driverless taxi gets stranded.
As far as I can tell, Tesla hasn’t started doing any of this. And that suggests to me that the company isn’t serious about entering the driverless taxi business. Rather, Tesla is building a driver-assistance system similar to (if perhaps more advanced than) those offered by other automakers. There’s nothing wrong with that. But it means that Tesla isn’t a direct competitor to Waymo and Cruise.