特斯拉首席执行官埃隆马斯克周三在公司第四季度财报电话会议上表示，人形机器人是特斯拉今年开发的“最重要的产品”，领先于大肆宣传的 Cybertruck 和其他车辆，包括 Semi 和跑车。
马斯克在 8 月首次使用机器人套装中的人类取笑“特斯拉 Bot”，并在公司的“人工智能日”期间警告说它“可能无法工作”，但他补充说，他希望明年能有一个原型。
“我认为随着时间的推移，它有可能比汽车业务更重要，”马斯克谈到代号为 Optimus 的机器人时说。
这位特斯拉老板补充说，该公司今年没有推出 Cybertruck 的计划，而且目前还没有开发 25,000 美元的汽车。他说，挥之不去的芯片短缺阻碍了新车型的发布，而不会导致交付的车辆总数减少。
虽然特斯拉机器人可能需要数年时间并且可能永远不会实现，但马斯克周三表示，如果它能够执行现在只能由人类执行的任务，它确实有可能彻底改变经济。
“如果你考虑经济，它是——经济的基础是劳动力，”他说。 “资本设备是经过提炼的劳动力。那么，如果您实际上没有劳动力短缺，会发生什么？我不确定当时的经济意味着什么。这就是擎天柱的意义所在，所以[它]非常重要。”
机器人技术的进步使公司能够用机器代替某些工人，但当前技术的局限性使得许多任务仍然需要由人类完成。
“[擎天柱]当然是为了友好，在人类世界中航行，消除危险、重复和无聊的任务，”马斯克在 8 月表示。
这个机器人是马斯克表演技巧的一个例子，他在其中宣布特斯拉正在开发令人兴奋的产品，这些产品计划在未来几年内帮助激发员工、客户和投资者的活力。通常，宣布的创新并未在预计的时间表内实现。
例如，在 2019 年 4 月的“自动驾驶日”活动中，马斯克表示，该公司将在 2020 年有 100 万辆自动驾驶“机器人出租车”上路。这些机器人出租车仍然不存在。
Elon Musk says it's more important for Tesla to make a robot than new car models this year
Tesla CEO Elon Musk said Wednesday on the company's fourth-quarter earnings call that a humanoid robot is the “most important product” that Tesla is developing this year, putting it ahead of the much-hyped Cybertruck and other vehicles, including the Semi and the Roadster.
Musk first teased the “Tesla Bot” in August using a human in a robot suit, warning during the company's “AI Day” that it “probably won't work” but added that he hoped to have a prototype in the next year.
“I think it has the potential to be more significant than the vehicle business over time,” Musk said of the robot, which is code-named Optimus.
The Tesla boss added the company has no plans to introduce the Cybertruck this year and that it isn't currently working on a $25,000 vehicle. The lingering chip shortage hampers the release of new models without resulting in fewer total vehicles being delivered, he said.
While the Tesla robot could be years away and may never come to fruition, Musk said Wednesday it does have the potential to revolutionize the economy if it can perform tasks that can now only be carried out by humans.
“If you think about the economy, it is — the foundation of the economy is labor,” he said. “Capital equipment is distilled labor. So what happens if you don't actually have a labor shortage? I'm not sure what an economy even means at that point. That's what Optimus is about, so [it's] very important.”
Advances in robotics have allowed companies to replace certain workers with machines, but the limitations of current technology are such that many tasks still need to be done by humans.
″[Optimus is] intended to be friendly, of course, and navigate through a world of humans, and eliminate dangerous, repetitive and boring tasks,” Musk said in August.
The robot is an example of Musk's showmanship, in which he announces that Tesla is working on exciting products scheduled for years into the future that help to energize employees, customers and investors. Often, the innovations announced aren't realized within the projected timeline.
For instance, at an “Autonomy Day” event in April 2019, Musk said the company would have 1 million autonomous “robotaxis” on the road in 2020. Those robotaxis still don't exist.
