AUSTIN: Tesla deployed a small group of self-driving taxis picking up paying passengers on Sunday in Austin, Texas, with CEO Elon Musk announcing the “robotaxi launch” and social-media influencers posting videos of their first rides.

The event marked the first time Tesla cars without human drivers have carried paying riders, a business that Musk sees as crucial to the electric car maker’s financial future.

He called the moment the “culmination of a decade of hard work” in a post on his social-media platform X and noted that “the AI chip and software teams were built from scratch within Tesla.” Teslas were spotted early on Sunday in a neighbourhood called South Congress with no one in the driver’s seat but one person in the passenger seat. The automaker planned a small trial with about 10 vehicles and front-seat riders acting as “safety monitors,” though it remained unclear how much control they had over the vehicles.

In recent days, the automaker sent invites to a select group of influencers for a carefully monitored robotaxi trial in a limited zone. The rides are being offered for a flat fee of $4.20, Musk said on X.

Tesla investor and social-media personality Sawyer Merritt posted videos on X showing him ordering, getting picked up and taking a ride to a nearby bar and restaurant, Frazier’s Long and Low, using a Tesla robotaxi app. If Tesla succeeds with the small deployment, it still faces major challenges in delivering on Musk’s promises to scale up quickly in Austin and other cities, industry experts say.

Published in Dawn, June 24th, 2025