Simply hours after Elon Musk claimed Reuters was “mendacity” about plans to ditch its $25,000 low price EV and as a substitute focus all its efforts on a robotaxi, the Tesla CEO introduced on X that he would reveal mentioned robotaxi in an occasion on August 8.

The announcement comes as Tesla EV gross sales have lagged and income have fallen, leaving the corporate and its CEO on a seek for one other product to spice up gross sales — or a minimum of the inventory worth.

Earlier Friday, a Reuters report citing three nameless sources and inside paperwork mentioned that Tesla was abandoning its plan to construct a lower-cost EV and would as a substitute focus sources on a deliberate robotaxi that’s being constructed on the identical small EV platform that was additionally speculated to energy the lower-cost automobile.

Musk took to X, the social community he owns, and claimed with out proof, that Reuters is “mendacity.” He didn’t dispute any particular particulars.

Hours later, Musk posted on X {that a} “Tesla Robotaxi” shall be unveiled August 8.

Studies have swirled for years that Tesla was engaged on these two automobiles. However Musk has wavered on whether or not to prioritize a typical automobile or one with no steering wheel or pedals, regardless of not having but produced a totally autonomous automobile, in accordance with descriptions in Walter Isaacson’s biography of Musk.

The CEO  pushed again in mid-2022 towards his engineers’ insistence on referencing a automobile with a steering wheel and pedals. And whilst he pressed forward, lead designer Franz von Holzhausen and engineering VP Lars Moravy stored the extra conventional automobile model alive as a “shadow venture,” Isaacson wrote on the time.

Musk has been promising autonomous capabilities in Tesla automobiles for years. In 2016, he mentioned Tesla would drive itself cross-country by the top of 2017 (it didn’t occur).  In 2019, he promised to launch the corporate’s first robotaxis as a part of broader imaginative and prescient for an autonomous ride-sharing community in 2020 (that additionally didn’t occur). A couple of years later, he mentioned a devoted robotaxi with no steering wheel or pedals would come to market by 2024.

Tesla automobiles come normal with a driver-assistance system branded as Autopilot. For an extra $12,000, house owners should purchase “full self-driving,” or FSD — a function that CEO Elon Musk has promised for years will someday ship full autonomous driving capabilities. Tesla automobiles usually are not self-driving. As a substitute, FSD consists of various automated driving options that also require the driving force to be able to take management always, together with the parking function Summon, in addition to Navigate on Autopilot, an energetic steerage system that navigates a automobile from a freeway on-ramp to off-ramp, together with interchanges and making lane modifications. The system can also be speculated to deal with steering on metropolis streets.