Tesla is on the verge of its Robotaxi announcement event on 8/8, and major investors like Ark Invest are examining and refreshing their bull case scenarios.
Robotaxi as a Focus
Ark Invest sees Robotaxi as a focus of Tesla’s ongoing business and sees Tesla’s autonomous ride-hailing revenue to net nearly $1 trillion in 2029. In comparison, they estimate Tesla’s vehicle sales to account for $0.4 trillion in revenue. With this bull case, Ark Invest also sees Tesla’s share price soaring to $3,100 by 2029. Ark Invest’s bear case sees the share price moving to $2,000 and robotaxi netting $0.63 billion in revenue.
Ark Invest gives Tesla a 58% chance of launching its robotaxi service in 2025, and a 38% chance in 2026. It’s clear that Tesla’s future lies in operating a fleet of autonomous vehicles and the question is just when it will happen. Given FSD’s massive improvements between FSD V11 and FSD V12, there is a possibility of Tesla meeting these estimates, although a lot depends on how fast improvements will continue to come. While FSD V12 is impressive, it’s still a long way from a true autonomous vehicle.
Rate of Improvement
Miles driven by Tesla FSD versus autonomous competitors
ARK Invest
Ark’s case is focused on the fact that FSD’s rapid improvement will continue, and a lot of that may be determined with the next few releases, including FSD 12.4.1, v12.5, and v12.6. When comparing Tesla to autonomous vehicles, Tesla has a drastic lead in miles driven, in fact, it’s so large that you can barely even see Tesla’s competitors. Tesla is at 1.3 billion miles driven with FSD, while the closest competitors are just reaching 15 million autonomous miles driven. While there’s a drastic difference in capabilities between Tesla’s FSD and autonomous vehicles such as Google’s Waymo, Tesla has the ability to gather data 86 times quicker.
Training data is key to building autonomous vehicles, and Tesla is currently the king of vehicle-related data.
Services Company
We previously wrote about whether Tesla’s future will be as a car company or a services company – and major investors such as Ark Invest and Morgan Stanley see Tesla’s AI services as a major driver of business in the future, and the focus of future revenue and profits.
Robotaxi, as both a service and as a physical product, has the opportunity to shake up markets in a unique way, providing quick, clean, and safe transportation between local destinations in urban areas, which could quickly outcompete traditional services like taxis, and tech competitors like Uber or Lyft. The market for robotaxi is untapped and massive, but Tesla isn’t the only one chasing the goal.
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Tesla’s Insurance program is offered in just a few US states - but it offers an integrated and seamless solution since it's built directly into the Tesla app. And now that experience is about to get even better if you own or subscribe to FSD.
With Tesla Insurance, you can view your documents, billing, payment details and even make claims right in the Tesla app. Additionally, Tesla offers varying levels of coverage with different plans, and you can also insure non-Tesla vehicles in addition to your Tesla.
In all states except for California, Tesla uses your Safety Score to help determine your insurance rate. So the safer you drive according to Tesla’s factors - the higher your Safety Score. A higher score means you pay less for insurance, while a lower score increases your rate. Rates can change on a month-to-month basis, so you can adjust your driving to become a safer driver to benefit more.
FSD Discount
Based on information pulled from Tesla’s latest app update - V4.41.0 - it seems that Tesla intends to introduce a new feature. These findings were discovered during a recent decompile of the Tesla app by Tesla App iOS. Tesla’s Safety Score already shows you how much you drive in FSD or Autopilot versus driving manually.
According to the decompiled information, the Safety Score may soon also factor in the percentage of time that you use FSD compared to the time you drive manually. It seems that driving on FSD more often will result in a higher safety score and, therefore, lower your insurance rate.
Sadly, Safety Score is only available to view if you subscribe to Tesla Insurance in a supported state. We’d love to see Tesla bring Safety Score to all users - whether or not they’re eligible or subscribed to Tesla Insurance. Seeing progress bars or seeing statistics improve in real-time can gamify becoming a safer driver.
Cheaper FSD?
This is an interesting change and could potentially even help attract people to use FSD more often. If you could cut your insurance rate by $50 a month and subscribe to FSD for just $99 a month - would that be enough of a positive factor for people to subscribe?
Effectively, if the discount is big enough, it could offset the cost of subscribing to FSD, increasing the revenue for Tesla.
We really hope this is the way Tesla is going because increasing FSD adoption will be key to both increasing real-world training data, as well as accelerating the adoption of a tech that will make roads safer both for FSD users and other road users.
We’re really looking forward to seeing how Tesla implements these changes - and hopefully they bring Tesla Insurance to even more states and countries in the near future.
After a truly long wait, it seems like Tesla is finally implementing Ultra-wideband (UWB) support for Android phones. Ultra-wideband allows for much more accurate phone tracking, leading to new features and a more reliable phone key. Tesla initially rolled out UWB Phone Key and app support for iOS users back with software update 2024.2.3 - which launched in February 2024.
Nearly a year later, we’re finally seeing signs of Tesla adding ultra-wideband support to Android devices. For Android users, this is exciting news, as it could add new features to your vehicle.
Android UWB Flag
A new flag related to ultra-wideband has been found in the latest Tesla app, version 4.41.0, thanks to a decompile by Tesla App iOS.
The new flag is labeled “MOBILE_APP_FEATURE_ANDROID_UWB_ENABLED,” which makes it pretty obvious that it’s related to Android UWB support.
Supported Devices
Most Android phones - especially flagship devices - already support and use UWB for other uses, but it’s not available on all phones. If you have a Google Pixel 6 or higher, Samsung Fold 2 or higher, Samsung S21+, or other recent Android phone, then your phone already supports ultra wideband.
However, since the advantage of UWB is the communication between the phone and the vehicle, your vehicle will need to support UWB as well.
Supported Models
Since ultra-wideband requires specific hardware, it can’t be added in a software update unless the hardware is already in the vehicle. Only some of the latest Tesla vehicles appear to support the new wireless protocol.
Here is the full list of supported Tesla models:
2024 Model 3 (Highland) and later
2021 Model S and later
2021 Model X and later
Cybertruck
2025 Model Y (Juniper) is expected to support UWB
The legacy Model S and Model X, as well as the first-gen Model 3 and current Model Y unfortunately do not support UWB.
More Reliable Phone Key
First up for UWB support is an improved phone key. The addition of UWB provides a low-power way for your vehicle to determine exactly where your device is in relation to your vehicle. That means the phone key will become more reliable - and more precise.
All supported vehicles above will support hands-free trunk opening, while automatic frunk opening is only supported on the Model S, Model X and Cybertruck.
For the first time, Android users will be able to set hands-free options for their vehicles, making it possible to open the trunk simply by standing behind the vehicle for two seconds. Once the vehicle detects you haven’t moved, a beep will sound and the trunk will open.
NFC Prompt
This app update is also adding a new interesting flag called SHOW_NFC_PROMPT. It seems Tesla is going to be adding a prompt to the app that will help people get back into their vehicles when their phone key fails. A device’s NFC capability actually remains active even if the phone has turned off due to a low battery. also remains active if you’ve drained the battery of your phone - so you’ll still be able to get into your vehicle and plop your phone on the charger.
Since Android devices can be set up and used as NFC key cards, you’ll be able to enter your vehicle even if your battery is depleted. This feature flag could be used to display something on your phone when the phone key fails to open the vehicle. It could ask you to use the device’s NFC capabilities or show you where to tap your phone or key card.
Release Date
Unfortunately, there’s no way of telling when this feature will arrive for Android users. However, seeing references in the app at least meaning that Tesla is at least actively developing the feature. While it could arrive any day now via a server-side change, it could also take another month or two for Tesla to complete any required testing across a variety of devices.
