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Self-driving car legislation paves way for Tesla Autopilot development

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The House passed a bipartisan driverless car bill Wednesday, paving the way for Tesla and other manufacturers to develop autonomous vehicles without having to hurdle substantial legislative barriers.

The bill opens the playing field for companies to develop and test new driverless technology without having to answer to individual state legislators. In addition to relaxing laws on the implementation of the technology, the bill also grants car manufacturers with the ability to deploy up to 100,000 self-driving vehicles per year that don’t meet standard safety regulations. The first year will be capped at 25,000 autonomous cars.

For Tesla, relaxed regulation means it has more freedom to test and develop driverless technology.

States will still be responsible for things like vehicle registration, insurance and driver education. Lawmakers say the bill is crucial in allowing for a potentially safer driving experience.

“Self-driving cars have the potential in the future to reduce deaths and injuries from car crashes, particularly those that result from driver distraction,” Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. (D-NJ), said on the House floor according to The Hill. “This bill allows for testing and deployment of self-driving cars to help the United States reach that potential sooner.”

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As CEO Elon Musk and Tesla’s Autopilot Vision team forge ahead with AI development, reports have surfaced that the company could be close to its first cross-country autonomous trip.

In early May, Musk boldly said that the journey could occur within the next few months.

(In) “November or December of this year, we should be able to go all the way from a parking lot in California to a parking lot in New York with no controls touched in the entire journey,” Musk said.

This kind of trip would be a major accomplishment for both Tesla and autonomous vehicle technology as a whole. With new, relaxed legislation, Tesla fans everywhere are hoping Tesla will be able to complete the journey from Lost Angeles to New York on or ahead of schedule.

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Tesla says texting and driving capability is coming ‘in a month or two’

“In the next month or two, we’re going to look at the safety statistics, but we’re going to allow you to text and drive, essentially.”

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Credit: Tesla

Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that within the next month or two, the company will be able to open the ability for people to text and drive because its Full Self-Driving suite will be robust enough to allow drivers to take their attention away from the road.

In its current state, Tesla Full Self-Driving is a supervised driver assistance suite that requires the vehicle operator to maintain control of the vehicle and pay attention to the road surroundings.

However, the company has been aiming to release a fully autonomous version of the Full Self-Driving suite for years, teasing its future potential and aiming to release a Level 5 suite as soon as possible.

CEO Elon Musk believes the company is on the cusp of something drastic, according to what he said at yesterday’s Annual Shareholder Meeting.

One thing Musk hinted at was that the company should be able to allow those sitting in the driver’s seat of their cars to text and drive “in the next month or two,” as long as the statistics look good.

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He said:

“In the next month or two, we’re going to look at the safety statistics, but we’re going to allow you to text and drive, essentially.”

The company recently transitioned to its v14 Full Self-Driving suite, which is its most robust to date, and recently expanded to Cybertruck, completing its rollout across the vehicle lineup.

Currently, Tesla is running v14.1.5, and when major improvements are made, that second number will increase, meaning v14.2 will be the next substantial improvement.

Musk said that v14.3 will be when you can “pretty much fall asleep and wake up at your destination.”

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We’ve heard a considerable amount of similar statements in the past, and Tesla owners have been conditioned to take some of these timeframes with autonomous driving with a grain of salt.

However, with the upgrades in FSD over the past few months, especially with the rollout of Robotaxi in Austin, which does not utilize anyone in the driver’s seat for local roads, it does not seem as if autonomy is that far off for Tesla.

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Tesla Semi undergoes major redesign as dedicated factory preps for deliveries

The Semi has been one of the most anticipated products in the Tesla lineup due to the disruption it could cause in the trucking industry.

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Tesla put its all-electric Semi truck through quite a major redesign as its dedicated factory for the vehicle is preparing for initial deliveries to the public starting next year.

The Semi has been one of the most anticipated products in the Tesla lineup due to the disruption it could cause in the trucking industry.

It has already been in numerous pilot programs for some pretty large companies over the past couple of years, PepsiCo. being one of them, and it is moving toward first deliveries to other companies sometime in 2026.

Yesterday at the 2025 Annual Shareholder Meeting, Tesla unveiled its new Semi design, which underwent a pretty significant facelift to match the aesthetic and vibe of the other vehicles in the company’s lineup.

Additionally, Tesla announced some other improvements, including changes to efficiency, and some other changes that we did not get details on yet.

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The first change was to the design of the Semi, as Tesla adopted its blade-like light bar for the Class 8 truck, similar to the one that is used on the new Model Y and the Cybertruck:

There also appear to be a handful of design changes that help with aerodynamics, as its efficiency has increased to 1.7 kWh per mile.

Tesla also said it has an increased payload capability, which will help companies to haul more goods per trip.

All of these changes come as the company’s Semi Factory, which is located on the same property as its Gigafactory in Reno, Nevada, is just finishing up. In late October, it was shown that the Semi facility is nearly complete, based on recent drone imagery from factory observer HinrichsZane on X:

Tesla Semi factory looks nearly complete

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The factory will be capable of producing about 50,000 Tesla Semi units annually when it is completely ramped. The company has major plans to help get the Semi in more fleets across the United States.

Other entities are also working to develop a charging corridor for electric Class 8 trucks. The State of California was awarded $102 million to develop a charging corridor that spans from Washington to Southern California.

Another corridor is being developed that spans from Southern California to Texas, and 49 applicants won $636 million from the Department of Transportation for it.

Tesla requested funding for it, but was denied.

The Semi has been a staple in several companies’ fleets over the past few years, most notably that of Frito-Lay and PepsiCo., who have reported positive experiences thus far.

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Musk said last year that the Semi had “ridiculous demand.”

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Tesla Cybercab production starts Q2 2026, Elon Musk confirms

Elon Musk highlighted that the fully autonomous vehicle will be the first Tesla designed specifically for unsupervised self-driving.

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Credit: Tesla/X

Tesla CEO Elon Musk confirmed that production of the company’s autonomous Cybercab will begin in April 2026, and its production targets will be quite ambitious. 

Speaking at Tesla’s 2025 Annual Shareholder Meeting, Musk highlighted that the fully autonomous vehicle will be the first Tesla designed specifically for unsupervised self-driving.

A robotaxi built for an autonomous world

Musk described the Cybercab as a clean-slate design optimized for autonomy, with no steering wheel, pedals, or side mirrors. “It’s very much optimized for the lowest cost per mile in an autonomous mode,” Musk said, adding that every Tesla produced in recent years already carries the hardware needed for full self-driving.

The Cybercab will be assembled at Giga Texas and will serve as the company’s flagship entry into the commercial robotaxi market. Musk emphasized that the project represents Tesla’s next evolutionary step in combining vehicle manufacturing, artificial intelligence, and mobility services.

One Cybercab every ten seconds

Musk reiterated that the Cybercab’s production process is more closely modeled on consumer electronics assembly than on traditional automotive manufacturing. This should pave the way for outputs that far exceed conventional automotive products.

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“That production is happening right here in this factory, and we’ll be starting production in April next year. The manufacturing system is unlike any other car. The manufacturing system of the Cybercab, it’s closer to a high volume consumer electronics device than it is a car manufacturing line. So the net result is that I think we should be able to achieve, I think, ultimately, less than a 10-second cycle time, basically a unit every 10 seconds.

“What that would mean is you could get on a line that would normally produce, say, 500,000 cars a year at a one minute cycle time, Model Y. This would be maybe as much as 2 million or 3 million, maybe ultimately it’s theoretically possible to achieve a 5 million unit production line if you can get to the 5-second cycle time,” the CEO said.

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