At the AI Day 2022 event, the electric car maker unveiled two humanoid robot prototypes that are part of the Tesla Optimus program. One unit was built with off-the-shelf parts and was already walking and moving on its own, while the other was built with off-the-shelf parts but still needed human assistance.
At the time, the Optimus bot, with its beautiful dark silver finish and custom parts, caught the attention of many. After all, this humanoid robot featured smoother movements, even though it still couldn’t walk independently like its predecessor.
A video Tesla showed at the recent 2023 Cyber Roundup suggests that the Optimus program has achieved a lot in the months since AI Day 2022 last September. The video shows several Optimus robot prototypes custom built with his parts performing various tasks. The prototype of the humanoid robot was also moving without permission.
Particularly striking are Optimus’ hand movements, which appear to be more precise and controlled. Elon Musk highlighted Optimus’ improvements during his presentation.
“I think the most noticeable difference is when we last introduced Optimus and when you look at this video that was basically shot yesterday, the Optimus team worked all night making this video. The Optimus team has done an incredible job,” Musk said.
Discussing the potential of the Optimus program, Elon Musk said humanoid robots could very well enter markets that electric vehicles could never reach. There’s a lot of work to do, but Optimus could propel Tesla into the future. But for now, the program is clearly underrated.
“If you have a generalized humanoid robot, what is the effective ratio of humanoid robots to humans? I mean, the real demand for something like Optimus, if it really works, if it really works, could be 10 billion units?
“If the ratio is 2 to 1, it could be 20 billion. A big part of it will be Optimus, and I’m very confident in that prediction,” Musk said.
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