A humanoid robot prototype named ‘Optimus’ was presented by Tesla CEO Elon Musk to the public during its company’s AI Day on Friday, September 30.
Musk showed off the robot in a bipedal which they said was only a “rough development robot,” walking and waving its hands in the air. During the presentation, Tesla employees displayed how the humanoid robot they are developing might function in the future, including with Tesla-designed actuators, which are like the muscle of the robot, and adaptive robotic hands that will allow the robot to grasp and manipulate a wide range of objects.
Musk said, ″We’re going to talk about the advancements in AI for Full Self-Driving, as well as how they apply more generally to real world AI problems like a humanoid robot and even going beyond that. I think there’s some potential that what we’re doing here at Tesla could make a meaningful contribution to AGI [artificial general intelligence].”
He continued, “And I think actually Tesla’s a good entity to do it, from a governance standpoint, because we’re a publicly-traded company with one class of stock. That means that the public controls Tesla, and I think that’s actually a good thing. So if I go crazy, you can fire me — this is important. Maybe I’m not crazy.”
During last year’s AI Day 2021, Musk said that, “It should be able to, ‘please go to the store and get me the following groceries,’ that kind of thing.”
Later, Musk said robots made by Tesla could one day be worth more than its cars, and that thousands of them would be put to work in Tesla factories, where humans build cars and batteries.
Musk explained that Tesla was holding this AI Day event, and showing off its robot prototype, “to convince some of the most talented people in the world like you guys, to join Tesla and help make it a reality.”
Musk thinks the humanoid robot “can help millions of people,” he said, because if it works, the world will have what he called “a future of abundance, a future where there is no poverty, where people you can have whatever you want in terms of products and services.”
Musk considers the bot “a fundamental transformation of civilization as we know it.”
After the CEO had left the stage but while the AI Day presentation was still underway, Musk wrote to his 107.4 million followers on Twitter, “Naturally, there will be a catgirl version of our Optimus robot.”
During a question-and-answer session, Musk admitted that developing a humanoid robot was not precisely in line with Tesla’s mission of accelerating the world’s transition to sustainable energy. He said Optimus expands the Tesla mission to “making the future awesome.”
He said he thinks in 3 to 5 years, customers will be able to buy an Optimus.
