The Dawn Project’s founder and software expert, Dan O’Dowd, has slammed Tesla Inc. TSLA for redacting its Robotaxi crash reports to the NHTSA. O’Dowd has been a vocal critic of the technology.
Tesla’s Supervised Robotaxi Had Three Crashes And An Injury, Says Dan O’Dowd
Taking to the social media platform X on Tuesday, O’Dowd criticized Tesla in a post. “In one month of operation Tesla’s supervised “Robotaxi” had three crashes and injured somebody,” O’Dowd said in his post, sharing an image of apparent NHTSA crash test reports, which shows the statement, “Redacted, may contain confidential business information,” against Tesla’s column.
O’Dowd said that Tesla was “terrified of the public learning how defective its software is,” adding that it was therefore hiding its reports, unlike “real robotaxi companies.”
Interestingly, below Tesla, reports submitted by Alphabet Inc.’s GOOGL GOOG autonomous ride-hailing company Waymo are visible in the image shared by O’Dowd.
NHTSA Probe Over Delays
O’Dowd’s comments come as the NHTSA had earlier launched a probe into Tesla over delays in submitting crash test reports for the company’s FSD and Autopilot software.
“Many of the reports were submitted as part of a single batch, while others were submitted on a rolling basis,” the agency said. Meanwhile, Tesla said that the delays had occurred due to issues with data collection, which have been fixed, according to the EV giant.
Tesla’s Autonomous Push, Robotaxi Expansion
The news comes as Tesla’s CEO, Elon Musk, recently shared that he was working with various departments within the EV giant, with a particular focus on Tesla’s artificial intelligence as well as autopilot capabilities.
Tesla also recently announced the expansion of its Robotaxi service in Austin, which would operate on the highways in the presence of an onboard safety operator now in the driver’s seat.
$1 Trillion Opportunity Amid Doubts Over Autonomy, FSD Lawsuits
Amid the autonomous push, Tesla bull Dan Ives recently predicted that autonomous driving and AI present a $1 trillion market opportunity for Tesla, despite doubts expressed by experts like Ross Gerber over Tesla achieving autonomy.
Tesla’s FSD also faces lawsuits filed by investors as well as customers over the technology’s effectiveness and safety, after the FSD-powered Robotaxi committed possible traffic violations during the Austin Robotaxi launch event in June.
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