Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi Doubts Tesla's Robotaxi Fleet Management Plans, But Maintains Hope For Partnership: 'It Doesn't Have To Be Either, Or…'

Uber Technologies UBER CEO Dara Khosrowshahi expressed doubts about Elon Musk‘s vision for Tesla Inc.’s TSLA future robotaxi fleet.

Khosrowshahi’s Concerns: Musk expects his company's robotaxi fleet to function like a combination of Airbnb and Uber. While a certain portion of the fleet will be owned by Tesla, individual customers can also add or subtract their vehicles to the robotaxi fleet at will. As for riders, they can summon a car using the Tesla App, Musk said during the company’s second-quarter earnings call last month.

Khosrowshahi, however, is not sure if a car owner is going to want his car to be ridden in by a complete stranger.

Furthermore, Tesla drivers will also likely want their car at the time when ridership is high, creating trouble in meeting demand, he said on an episode of The Logan Bartlett Show published on Friday.

Building cars and operating a taxi fleet are “very very different” businesses, the Uber CEO noted. While running a fleet, the company has to match people with their rides, and price the rides economically while also addressing other concerns like people getting sick in a car, losing items, or getting involved in accidents, he said.

Possible Partnership: Khosrowshahi, however, is positive about a future partnership with Tesla.

“It’s taken us 15 years (to develop an efficient working system). It’s taken us tens of billions of dollars of capital, and we can provide that instantly to a partner,” Khosrowshahi said. “Hopefully, Tesla will be one of those partners, you never know.”

Autonomous cars in the future will function like food chains such as McDonald’s or Starbucks which have a direct channel to consumers and also use third-party channels for the complete utilization of their restaurants, the Uber CEO opined.

“If you want to drive utilization of that asset, you’re going to want to engage definitely in third-party and if you want to develop your own first-party channel as well, that can be true. It doesn’t have to be either/ or,” Khosrowshahi said.

Why It Matters: However, Musk said last month that Tesla will not give its vehicles to third parties for autonomous operations.

"There's an important clause we've put in every Tesla purchase, which is that the Tesla vehicles can only be used in the Tesla fleet. They cannot be used by a third party for autonomy," Musk then said.

Tesla is now expected to unveil its dedicated robotaxi product on Oct.10. The event was initially scheduled for Aug.8 but the company delayed it to make a few important changes aimed at improving the robotaxi and to give itself time to prepare a ‘couple of other things' to showcase at the event, Musk said in July.

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