Tesla’s Optimus bot makes a scene at the robotaxi event

A bunch of Tesla’s humanoid Optimus robots walked out alongside the reveal of Tesla’s new Robovan vehicle at tonight’s Cybercab event. The robot is also seen in a video doing daily human tasks like bringing in a package off the porch.

“The Optimus will walk amongst you,” Tesla CEO Elon Musk qips. He explains that you can walk up to them and that they can do things like serve you drinks. “I think this will be the biggest product ever of any kind,” Musk says.

After the presentation, livestream footage showed people interacting with Optimus robots at tables and in crowds, but the robots weren’t doing much other than waving in the style of Astro Bot. There was a table of drinks — but the Optimus bot did not serve anything. However, at another table, one bot could hand over small gift bags and play rock paper scissors with guests.

The Tesla bot was not a serious product when Musk first revealed the project in 2021, when a man in a robot suit took the stage to perform a silly dance. But in 2022, the company showed off a crude prototype that gingerly walked onstage.

Musk has loftily promised that Optimus will be a “fundamental transformation for civilization.” And he made bigger ones for the investors: that it’ll bring “two orders of magnitude” of potential improvement of economic output and that it can be “made in very high volume, ultimately millions of units.” Musk said it would cost around “$20,000” and allow for “a future where there is no poverty.”