- Uber’s CEO wants to work with Tesla on robotaxis. But Tesla wants to go it alone.
- Uber partners with Waymo in Austin and will compete with Tesla’s autonomous vehicle platform.
- Analysts suggest Tesla may need Uber or Lyft to scale its robotaxi operations.
Uber’s CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi, said he wants to work with Tesla on robotaxis — even though the electric vehicle maker isn’t interested right now.
“At this point, they want to build it alone,” Khosrowshahi said in an interview with Bloomberg at the Future Investment Initiative conference in Miami on Friday. “Life is long, but we would love to partner with them.”
Khosrowshahi added that Uber and Alphabet-owned Waymo, who partner in Austin, will compete with Tesla in the autonomous vehicles market when they launch in the city.
Earlier this month, Uber said it was opening an “interest list” for Austin users who want to be the first to try Waymo robotaxis on the Uber app. Tesla unveiled its robotaxis, called Cybercabs, in October. They are expected to launch in June in Austin.
Khosrowshahi’s Friday remarks came about a week after he said that he hoped Tesla would work with Uber.
In an interview published on February 14, Khosrowshahi said, “No one wants to compete against Tesla or Elon, if you can help it.”
Door open for Tesla
Musk has previously said Tesla would create its own ride-hailing platform — a cross between Uber and Airbnb apps — for riders to call a driverless car. While a portion of the fleet would be owned by Tesla, individual Tesla customers would also have the option to add their vehicles.
Despite these plans, Khosrowshahi’s Friday remarks suggested he was willing to keep the door open for a partnership with Tesla.
“It makes a lot of economic sense” for Tesla drivers to use Uber as a platform, he said. “What we bring is demand to the AV ecosystem when demand often is quite variable.”
Analysts have stressed this, too.
In a note published on the day the Cybercab was unveiled, Jefferies analysts wrote that Tesla may struggle without a partner like Uber or Lyft.
Tesla “potentially underappreciates the obstacles to scaling a robotaxi fleet” such as the technology, asset ownership, regulation, fleet management, and demand required to run an operation at scale, the analysts wrote. “We also believe TSLA could struggle to scale fleet operations without offering access to demand via Uber/Lyft.”
Independent analyst Dan O’Dowd, a previous Musk critic, said that the contrast between Tesla and robotaxi competitors like Waymo was “stark.”
“Until Tesla robotaxis are transporting 100,000 paying customers a week around major American cities like Waymo does, Tesla robotaxi is nothing more than the latest work of fiction to come out of the Warner Bros. Studio,” he said in a note at the time.
Investor pressure
Uber has faced pressure from investors to ramp up its autonomous vehicle strategy, and shareholders have been closely monitoring developments with self-driving competitors.
In December, Uber’s stock plunged 10% after Waymo announced its expansion to Miami — without mentioning Uber.
In some cities, like Austin, Phoenix, and Atlanta, Waymo rides are only available on the Uber app. In Los Angeles and San Francisco, Waymo is available on its own booking platform.
Days after the Waymo expansion news, Uber’s stock fell nearly 6% when its AV partner, Cruise, announced it was shutting down operations.
Following the Cruise news, the ride-hailing platform’s chief financial officer, Prashanth Mahendra-Rajah, tried to quell investor concerns. He said the company was well positioned to be a demand aggregator for AVs and that it still believes AVs are critical for its growth.
Besides Waymo, Uber has self-driving partnerships with Tesla’s biggest competitor, Chinese EV maker BYD, and with AV company Aurora Innovation.
Uber’s stock is up over 30% so far this year.
