00:00Tesla is expected to report its first quarterly cash burn in over two years on Wednesday
00:05as its spending on AI and robotics sores intensifying investor scrutiny over when those bets will pay off.
00:12CEO Elon Musk has pivoted the electric vehicle maker's focus from manufacturing cars
00:16to building so-called physical AI businesses such as self-driving taxis and humanoid robots.
00:22Much of Tesla's valuation hangs on that promise.
00:30Vehicles operating with no people inside and no safety monitors in three cities in Texas
00:34and probably will be widespread in the U.S. by the end of this year and hopefully in Israel too.
00:45Five years from now, or certainly ten years from now, my guess is, if you say like ten years from
00:51now,
00:52probably 90% of all distance driven will be driven by the AI in a self-driving car.
01:01So, overwhelmingly, it'll be quite a niche thing in ten years to actually be driving your own car.
01:08Because the car will drive you.
01:10I think there will also be humanoid robots that are pretty much everywhere.
01:18However, investors are growing increasingly uneasy as spending on AI, infrastructure including data centers and manufacturing capacity
01:27is projected to climb to US$25 billion this year,
01:32outstripping quarterly cash generated by Tesla's core automotive and energy operations.
01:37Investors have been betting that Tesla's autonomous driving technology and robotics ambitions could eventually unlock new high-margin revenue streams.
01:48But progress has been slower than many analysts expected, and Musk has missed some self-imposed deadlines.
01:56Soon after launching its robotaxi service in Austin, Texas in April last year,
02:01Musk predicted Tesla robotaxis would serve half of the U.S. population by the end of 2025.
02:07In January, Tesla said the service would expand to seven new cities in the first half of 2026.
02:13But its robotaxi network remains confined to Austin, Dallas, Houston in Texas, and Miami in Florida.
02:21Tesla delivered a record number of vehicles for the April to June period,
02:25far exceeding market estimates as high oil prices helped drive sales of EVs, especially in Europe.
02:32Analysts aspect Tesla to deliver 1.7 million vehicles in 2026, up 3.9% from last year,
02:39which would snap a two-year scared of declining annual deliveries.
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