Insight: Private Robotaxis – Defeating the Purpose?

Tensor aims to challenge the robotaxi market by offering privately-owned L4 autonomous sedans, competing with Tesla’s FSD fleet.

L4 robotaxi maker Tensor is promising privately-owned L4 autonomy in a premium-priced and trimmed sedan in the hopes that private ownership may make the robotaxi more appealing to consumers. While this seems to run contrary to the orthodoxy of the autonomous vision of “maximum utilization” it could reach a new customer base willing to pay for the convenience of autonomy in a private ownership context. However, the elephant in the room remains Tesla, with hundreds of thousands of vehicles with FSD capability, and a constantly evolving software stack.