Everything Tesla Announced During Its Earnings Call - Robotaxi Details, HW3 Support, FSD and More

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Did you miss Tesla’s Q3 2024 Earnings Call, or just want to review everything Tesla announced? Either way, we’ve got an outline of everything Tesla announced during the call.

This call was strongly focused on autonomy and revealed a lot more details about Tesla’s plans for its ride sharing service and the Cybercab.

Below is a section-by-section outline of both the actual earnings call and Q&A session and the investor slide deck.

Autonomy and FSD

• Tesla is still focusing hard on autonomy

• There were 50 autonomous vehicles at the We, Robot event

  • Carried thousands of people with no incidents or issues

  • 20 were Cybercabs and 30 were regular Model Ys

• Cybercab will reach volume production by 2026

  • Expected to reach 2 million units per year for initial capacity

  • Tesla could see expanding it to 4 million units per year

• There have been significant improvements in FSD year-to-date

  • FSD launched in the Cybertruck, FSD V12.5 launched most recently

  • Actually Smart Summon is a taste of Unsupervised FSD

  • Single Stack for Highway and City, all end-to-end, all neural nets coming soon in V13

  • 100x improvement in miles per intervention between FSD v11.4.9 and FSD v12.5

  • Tesla expects a 5-6x improvement in miles per intervention between FSD v12.5 and FSD v13

  • By Q2 next year Tesla expects FSD to have higher miles per critical intervention than the average human’s miles per collision

    • This is the “safer than a human” mark Tesla is aiming for

  • Hardware 4 has made significant strides in helping progress FSD due to the available processing power

• Tesla will continue to roll out more 30-day trials with every significant FSD improvement

  • FSD has seen an increased take-rate after We, Robot

Internal Testing for Robotaxi

• Tesla employees in the California Bay Area have already been testing Tesla’s Robotaxi service, which is run with Model Y’s

  • These vehicles have a safety driver

  • Tesla is also testing the Robotaxi / ridesharing app internally

Ride Hailing

• Ride Hailing/Robotaxi network’s initial rollout will begin in Texas and maybe California next year

  • California’s regulatory approvals will be challenging, and Texas may happen sooner.

  • California may be delayed to 2026

  • Other states that follow Texas could come sooner

• Driverless Teslas will be offering paid rides sometime next year

• Some recently released features were designed for the Robotaxi, but went to every Tesla

  • Robotaxis will automatically load and adopt your Tesla profile, logging you into media apps, adjusting the vehicle’s climate and seat settings for comfort

  • Navigation can be done with the phone app, and you can also track progress of Robotaxis on-route

• Cybercab, Models S3XY, already meet federal vehicle regulations for autonomy

• State vehicle regulations are all over the place, each state has different (or no) process for autonomy

Hardware 3

• “Vast Majority” of Tesla’s vehicles on the road today will be capable of autonomy

• Tesla will continue to iterate FSD on HW4 first, and then backport to HW3

• HW3 does not “fundamentally support” kernel features, and Tesla has to use tricks and additional work to get it to function

• Elon admits he is not 100% sure HW3 will be capable of autonomy

• If HW3 cannot do the job, Tesla will upgrade HW3 computers for owners who have purchased FSD.

  • Tesla has previously said multiple times this was not possible, this is big news

  • Upgrade will only cover the inference computers, not cameras or other parts

Affordable Model - 25K

• Tesla’s more affordable model is still on track for the first half of 2025.

• It will be built on the same next-gen platform as Cybercab, with an estimated 5.5mi/kWh.

  • This will be Tesla’s most efficient powertrain.

• Tesla will continue to innovate to reduce the cost of its current lineup (S, 3, X, Y, CT).

  • CT is now profit neutral/approaching profitability

Semi

• Semi factory is well under construction, CapEx for the factory is complete

• Pilot builds of the updated Semi begin next year

• Production ramp begins in 2026

• Lots of signaled demand from trucking companies

  • Tesla is not expecting a demand issue

• Cost per mile per ton is far lower than diesel trucks

  • Companies that don’t adopt Semi won’t be able to keep up

• Pepsi’s drivers don’t want to go back to their old vehicles, fight to stay on Tesla’s Semis

• “Couple hundred” already deployed this year

  • Tesla is training the Semi fleet on FSD, will deploy FSD to the Semi when its ready.

Roadster

• Roadster is the “cherry on the icing on the cake”

• Not a priority for the Tesla mission

• Will come after other items that have a bigger impact on the mission (25K Model, etc.,)

• Design is close to finalization

Service

• Tesla is trying to fix issues upstream - at the factory level - to reduce service wait times

• Tesla is looking to establish dedicated service facilities where they have dedicated lanes and technicians for certain specific issues

• Throughput of service matters

• Tesla, unlike other auto manufacturers, services cars

  • Normally, car dealers, not manufacturers make money on service

  • Tesla does not make money on service

  • Tesla has an incentive to reduce servicing costs as much as possible

• Tesla is working on automating vehicle diagnostics and prep work

  • Vehicle self-diagnoses, information is provided to Tesla

  • Parts arrive, lift is booked and tools prepared

  • Vehicle arrives, technician is fully aware of the issue and can immediately fix the problem without wasting time

  • Already, most of the time Tesla doesn’t need to diagnose the issue, the car diagnoses itself and reports potential problems to Service.

4680 Cell

• Tesla has produced the 100 millionth 4680 cell in Q3 2024.

• Rapidly becoming the most competitive cell in terms of price

  • Tesla’s internally produced 4680 will be the most cost-competitive cell in North America

• Continued progress on the dry-cathode line and expanding past the initial test batch

• Tesla will continue to rely upon external cell providers

  • Lots of capacity is needed for both vehicles and stationary storage that can’t be achieved internally

AI and Optimus

• AI training capacity is still expanding

• Tesla is not compute constrained right now, especially with Cortex coming online

  • FSD is getting good enough that it is hard to find and figure out issues

  • Can see 10,000 miles of FSD video and not find an issue in current builds

• Tesla is testing both virtually and physically

  • Real-life physical testing offers additional benefits, interacting with real humans, etc.,

• Optimus’ new hand has 22 DoF, and is extremely humanlike

  • Tesla is likely the only company that can scale humanoid robots

  • This is likely due to Tesla’s extreme vertical integration, including batteries, actuators, sensors, software, and inference

  • FSD provides the humanlike brain, while Tesla’s factories can provide volume production capabilities

• Grok in Tesla / Infotainment

  • Tesla will keep expanding what’s available for infotainment, will include AI support

  • Will also include browser improvements, movies, games, productivity

Energy

• Energy is still doing well, lots of space to continuing scaling this business sector

• Megafactory Lathrop is doing 200 Megapacks a week, for 40GWh a year

• Shanghai will begin doing 20GWh per year, starting Q1 2025

• Tesla wants to ship at least 100GWh per year by the end of 2025

• Tesla wants to meet the stationary energy demands for a sustainable energy future

  • This includes the delivery of multiple terawatt hours per year

• No material limitations on stationary battery business expansion

  • No rare materials or complex procedures are involved in the production process

Financial & Deliveries

• Tesla has pushed out record deliveries this quarter.

• No other EV company or EV section of another automaker is profitable

• Tesla’s future is the world’s future - autonomous and fully electric

• As Tesla executes on its objectives, Tesla will become the most valuable company in the world.

• Tesla has done an excellent job executing in a difficult fiscal and regulatory environment so far

• As cyclic fiscal and standing regulatory challenges are overcome, Tesla can continue to expand and grow in value

• Automotive revenue grew Quarter over Quarter

  • Financial incentives have hurt direct profit numbers, but increased overall sales considerably

  • Tesla will continue to offer compelling financing options, but sparingly

  • Tesla has a compelling overall package - safety, autonomy, features, total cost of ownership

  • Tesla acknowledges there is an awareness gap about these items with new and old buyers alike

• Tesla has had their vehicle margins grow Quarter over Quarter due to optimizations

• Tesla continues to squeeze costs without compromising on the customer experience

• Tesla has benefitted from lower freight and duties by delivering vehicles locally in markets where possible

  • North American vehicles from North America, European vehicles from Giga Berlin, Asian vehicles from China

• Decline in interest rates as economy steadies will have a drastic impact on automotive demand

  • Due to interest rates, people have been holding onto cars longer, especially in North America

  • This has impacted new vehicle sales, as people are hesitant to spend money

  • Tesla sees an opportunity to educate and find new buyers in this market sector

• Energy saw a decline in Q3, due to cyclic conditions

  • Projects are long term, and many begin in Q3, while ending in other quarters

  • Q4 will show growth for Energy

  • Q3 has been Tesla’s off-quarter for Energy (2021, 2022, 2023)

• Tesla’s Q2 restructuring continuing to impact the company, will have no more impacts after Q4

• GPU deployments continue, and Tesla will continue making quarterly investments, but sparingly

  • As it stands, Tesla has more GPU capacity than they can work with now - not compute constrained

• Fragmented regulatory landscape will cause issues for the rollout of the Robotaxi Network and Unsupervised FSD

• Most automotive companies have not internalized autonomy or EVs, and Tesla is a leader in both sectors
  

If you’d like to listen to the earnings call, it’s available below.

Plus, Tesla put out a highlight list of some of their biggest achievements for this quarter here on X.

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Elon Musk Takes Over Tesla Sales For North America and Europe

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Following the recent departure of longtime deputy Omead Afshar, Elon Musk has stepped up to personally oversee Tesla’s sales operations in North America and Europe, according to a new report from Bloomberg, which cites people familiar with the matter.

This is a big shake-up that places Elon directly in charge of fixing Tesla’s sales slump in two key markets. The move has come as Tesla reported nearly on-the-ball deliveries for Q2 2025, hitting 384k deliveries, against a consensus street estimate of 385k deliveries.

New Leadership Structure

According to the report, Afshar’s former responsibilities are being divided between Elon and Senior VP Tom Zhu. Elon will now directly oversee the sales organizations in the US and Europe. As part of this change, Troy Jones, Tesla’s VP of North America Sales, will now report to Elon.

Tom Zhu, who is based in China, will continue to manage sales in Asia while also taking on the critical new responsibility of overseeing global manufacturing operations. Leadership of Tesla’s factories in Fremont, California, and Texas will now report to Tom. Tesla Energy’s factories will still report to Michael Snyder, VP of Energy and Charging.

For now, we’re unsure whether this is a temporary management structure, if the reporting lines will shift, or if Tesla will either hire or promote a new Senior VP of Sales to cover the duties.

Tackling the Sales Slump

The restructuring is a response to the recent downturn in sales. Analysts estimated that Tesla would deliver approximately 385k vehicles, which they essentially managed to achieve. However, deliveries fell short of production numbers, with Tesla delivering just 373k of the 410k vehicles produced.

This situation is particularly challenging in Central Europe. Europe has been noted as Tesla’s weakest market, according to Elon. Interestingly, Elon previously stated in several interviews over the last few months that there was no demand issue, but it now seems that there have been some issues with growing sales.

With Tesla’s new vehicle registrations across Europe having plunged 37% since the start of this year, and the rollout of the new affordable model, as well as more affordable versions of the Model 3 and Model Y seemingly delayed, there is a lot to do. Some analysts are projecting a second consecutive annual decline in Tesla’s global car sales for 2025.

The Rise of Tom Zhu

A key note in this reshuffle is the return of Tom Zhu to a top global operations role. Tom had previously led the construction and ramp-up of Giga Shanghai and was then promoted to Senior VP of Automotive Operations in 2023. Last year, he was sent back to China to focus on tackling regulatory hurdles with the launch of FSD in China.

His return to overseeing global manufacturing, even while staying in China, is a significant vote of confidence in his abilities. It also comes as Chinese authorities have begun drafting new autonomy guidelines to clear a path for the broader rollout of both Supervised and potentially Unsupervised FSD.

Wrap Up

This major restructuring shows that Elon is once again focused on Tesla and plans to personally tackle the company’s biggest issues. This will require a careful hand, as Elon’s forays into politics have caused self-admitted brand damage. If anyone can turn this around and have the Model Y return as the Best-Selling Vehicle of 2026, having just missed out by a few thousand vehicles to the Toyota RAV4, it is Elon.

Alongside him, Tom Zhu will be responsible for streamlining global manufacturing and ensuring that Tesla is ready to launch their new affordable variants in the near future, which should also make a considerable dent in sales.

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Tesla Shares Q2 2025 Numbers: Production and Deliveries Up Over Last Quarter

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Tesla has released its Q2 2025 production and delivery numbers, revealing an improvement in production and deliveries over Q1, but still down from a year ago.

Tesla produced 410,244 vehicles in Q2, nearly equal to their production a year ago, which was 410,831 vehicles. Production for this quarter was significantly up compared to Q1 2025, which only saw 362,615 vehicles produced. While production numbers matched those of a year ago, actual deliveries were down.

Q2 2025 saw Tesla deliver 384,122 vehicles, which was down approximately 59,000 units compared to the same period last year, but up by approximately 48,000 vehicles, or about 14% compared to Q1.

Breakdown by Model

The Model 3/Y segment continues to dominate Tesla’s production profile, accounting for 396,835 units produced and 373,728 delivered in Q2 2025. Deliveries for the “Other Models” category—which includes the Cybertruck, Model S, and Model X—were down compared to the previous quarter, with just 10,394 vehicles delivered, a 20% decline. Compared to a year ago, the drop for these vehicles is even more drastic, with sales being down 52%. Tesla refreshed its Model S and Model X last month with new features; however, the update was much smaller than expected and likely didn’t help much in increasing sales for these vehicles.

Tesla doesn’t break down Cybertruck sales separately, but those deliveries are expected to be down as well.

Tesla noted that 2% of total deliveries this quarter were accounted for under operating lease agreements, consistent with the same quarter last year.

Context and Market Response

While the numbers exceeded some bearish expectations, the year-over-year delivery drop is Tesla’s second straight quarterly decline. Analysts attribute declining sales to increasing EV competition and reputation issues.

Still, investors found relief in the improved quarter when compared to Q1. The stock rebounded about 4% yesterday on the news.

Looking ahead, all eyes are on Tesla’s Robotaxi network, the Cybercab, and the more affordable model, which is slated to be released later this year.

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