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- At TechCrunch Disrupt, Jesse Levinson revealed he owns a Tesla.
- He occasionally utilizes the vehicle’s Full Self-Driving feature.
- The experience can be “stressful,” as it may lead to driver complacency.
Jesse Levinson, the cofounder and chief technical officer of Zoox—a robotaxi company backed by Amazon—shared his apprehensions regarding Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (FSD) mode during his presentation at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference in San Francisco. He admitted that while he does own a Tesla and sometimes engages its FSD capabilities, it often leaves him feeling uneasy.
The FSD technology is pivotal for Tesla’s aspirations towards fully autonomous vehicles and robotaxis. Recently, CEO Elon Musk announced plans to introduce unsupervised self-driving cars in California and Texas by next year with robotaxi production slated for 2026. However, Levinson pointed out that while FSD generally performs well most of the time, there are moments when it falters unexpectedly—leading to a stressful driving experience.
“It can be quite nerve-wracking because it usually makes correct decisions but then suddenly leads you into a false sense of security before making an error,” said Levinson. This sentiment reflects broader concerns as Musk pushes forward with ambitious timelines amidst increasing regulatory scrutiny over Tesla’s technology. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is currently investigating several incidents involving FSD—including one tragic accident where a pedestrian was struck by an operating vehicle using this feature.
Tesla’s official website clarifies that their FSD systems necessitate “active driver supervision” and do not render vehicles fully autonomous. A representative from Tesla did not provide comments on this matter; similarly, Zoox representatives opted not to elaborate further on their stance regarding these issues.
Levinson criticized Tesla’s reliance solely on camera technology for its autonomous driving capabilities. He argued that current technological advancements do not support safe full autonomy through cameras alone—a viewpoint echoed by various critics who have questioned Musk’s decision to eliminate radar systems in favor of external cameras for navigation purposes.
“As a society, we lack the necessary technology to process camera data effectively enough to drive as safely as humans do,” he stated emphatically. He emphasized that Zoox believes future robotaxis must be “significantly safer” than human drivers due to public intolerance toward robotic errors: “To achieve this level of safety requires far more advanced hardware than what is currently implemented in Teslas.”
Despite skepticism surrounding some aspects of Tesla’s approach to self-driving technologies, others within the industry maintain optimism about its potential trajectory. Andrej Karpathy—former senior director of AI at Tesla—recently mentioned on a podcast that while LiDAR technology is indeed utilized by Musk’s company during initial training phases for data collection purposes; it’s not yet deployed at scale like competitors such as Waymo which employs LiDAR alongside radar systems across its fleet including Jaguar I-PACE SUVs available for ridesharing services.
Karpahy noted that this method could ultimately position Tesla advantageously over time due to its scalability potential compared with traditional approaches used by rivals like Waymo or even Zoox itself which integrates LiDAR along with radar and cameras into their autonomous driving framework.
Levinson confirmed during his talk that testing will soon commence for Zoox’s robotaxi service within San Francisco’s South Market area as well as along Las Vegas Strip routes within weeks ahead.
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