Cathie Wood Predicts Trillion Dollar Revenue Opportunity For Tesla In Autonomous Vehicles: 'Winner-Takes-Most' In AI And Driving Tech

ARK Invest CEO Cathie Wood painted a bullish picture for Tesla Inc’s TSLA future in the autonomous vehicle market, while also sharing insights on the booming artificial intelligence sector and the potential for companies like OpenAI to go public.

What Happened: Wood, known for her optimistic tech forecasts and her company’s flagship ARK Innovation ETF ARKK, sees a “winner-takes-most” scenario unfolding in the autonomous driving space. Wood in an interview with Yahoo Finance predicts this could translate into a staggering “trillion-dollar-plus revenue opportunity for Tesla in the next five years.”

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“The company that gets people from point A to point B the fastest, safest, and with the least wait time is going to dominate the market,” Wood explained, emphasizing the high stakes in the race for autonomous technology supremacy.

Her comments come as OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, raised $6.6 billion in a recent funding round, achieving a valuation of approximately $157 billion. ARK Invest has been among the firms investing in OpenAI, signaling Wood’s broader bet on the AI sector.

Wood identified OpenAI, Anthropic, xAI, Alphabet Inc‘s GOOGL GOOG Google, and Meta Platforms Inc. META as companies “stealing the march” in the AI space.

She expressed optimism about the development of agentic AI, which she believes will pave the way for increased profitability as companies can charge premium rates for more advanced AI capabilities.

Tesla’s "We, Robot" event is scheduled for Thursday at 10 p.m. EDT, with investors hoping that the event will give a lift to the stock. 

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Why It Matters: Addressing concerns about OpenAI’s recent executive departures, Wood praised the leadership of CEO Sam Altman and CFO Sarah Friar. She noted that rapid growth often necessitates management changes, stating, “What we witness in companies that are growing very quickly from startup into scaling is you need a different kind of management team.”

On the topic of AI companies potentially going public, Wood observed a trend of firms staying private longer. She cited regulatory burdens and short-term investor mindsets in public markets as deterrents. However, she suggested that lower interest rates and increased investor patience for long-term strategies could make public offerings more attractive in the future.

Turning back to Tesla, Wood addressed the company’s long-promised autonomous driving capabilities. “It’s no longer a question of if, but when, for Tesla,” she said, pointing to Google-owned Waymo’s progress as evidence that autonomous driving is becoming a reality.

Wood’s firm has published a model on its website and GitHub, allowing investors to explore various scenarios for the autonomous vehicle market’s growth. According to their research, the platform opportunity for companies hosting autonomous networks could represent a “$4 to $5 trillion revenue opportunity over the next 5 to 10 years.”

The ARK Venture Fund agreed to invest at least $250 million in OpenAI’s historic funding round. This investment marks ARK’s second in the AI firm, which has been pivotal in the generative AI space since launching ChatGPT.

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