Musk: Tesla Full Self-Driving Will Be Ready In 2021

At the Axel Springer conference in Germany, Tesla Inc TSLA CEO Elon Musk said he believes Tesla will have fully autonomous, level five vehicles on the road in 2021.  

This would mean that a driver and steering wheel are optional, as the vehicles would be fully capable of driving themselves in all scenarios.

Tesla has been developing fully autonomous cars.

For now, the company sells a software option for customers that can do all driving on the highway, including interchanges and exits, but must be monitored at all times. The company has also released a limited access version of the software that can drive itself in most scenarios. 

Musk's main concern is regulation. Once Tesla achieves full autonomy, the more difficult part of rolling it out will be dealing with regulatory bodies from multiple countries, in his view.

But he hopes that billions of autonomous miles safely driven can help convince authorities to allow the tech into the hands of customers. 

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Benzinga's Take: While it may seem like a difficult task today, these systems advance quickly when fed lots of data.

All Tesla vehicles that are sold now are equiped with the hardware needed for full self-driving, according to Tesla.

All Tesla vehicles are constantly collecting data and sending it to Tesla to train the computer that drives the car. And the car will never be tired or impaired like a human. 

Photo courtesy of Tesla.