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Porsche admits EV investment to take on Tesla is an “enormous burden”
It’s no secret that Porsche is looking to soak up market share away from Tesla when the automaker releases its long range, all-electric Mission E in 2019. Arguably one of Tesla’s strongest potential competitors, with decades of manufacturing expertise and support from parent company Volkswagen AG, the German automaker specializing in high performance vehicles is preparing to face financial headwinds as it aims to electrify its fleet.
Porsche’s CFO, Lutz Meschke, recently spoke with Automotive News Europe about the company’s plan to stay profitable as it invests billions into its electric vehicle program.
“Today Porsche packs 8,000 to 10,000 euros in added content into an electrified vehicle, but those costs cannot be passed on via the price. The customer won’t accept it, just the opposite, in some parts of the world there’s a certain hesitation,” said Meschke in his interview with Automotive News Europe.
As Porsche looks to invest more than 3 billion euros ($3.5 billion USD) into the development of EVs and plug-ins, the automaker will continue to build internal combustion engine vehicles in parallel and implement company-wide cost-cutting measures to retain its profit margin. “That’s an enormous burden for a company of our size.” says Meschke.
“To protect your margin, you have to look at substantial fixed cost cuts, but there’s only so much potential since the biggest chunks are personnel and development. As sales shift toward EVs, a temporary drop in profitability in the midterm may be expected.”
For context, Porsche’s investment into its EV program amounts to roughly 70% of what Tesla’s Gigafactory will cost when complete. It’s a massive undertaking that Porsche admits will require company restructuring along with financial incentives to its workforce. “We need to structure the company so that it is in position to sustainably achieve that. There can always be years when it might drop to below 15 percent due to exchange rates or an economic crisis, but every worker has to know we are not letting up.” says Porsche’s CFO. “There’s even a pension component.”
By setting a fixed margin target of 15% on a company-wide basis, Porsche’s entire workforce is able to work towards a single goal as looks to maintain a steady CapEx and R&D ratio. “It’s better for Porsche to work with a fixed margin target. It’s really an internal steering instrument. That’s why everyone in the company from the manager to the assembly line worker knows the goal is 15 percent. If we work with a range, that effect is diluted.”
Porsche Mission E concept rendering
When asked by Automotive News Europe on whether Porsche will need to implement a deep cost-cutting program to maintain the company’s high margins, Meschke responded “Under our Porsche Improvement Process, we aim for annual savings of at least 3 percent in indirect areas and 6 percent in direct ones.” Moreover, Porsche’s exec notes that the company performs a cross-department review each year to see if they were able to maintain a 10% savings. “There can always be a time when we need to pull on all levers, but identifying and extracting efficiencies is our everyday business. That way we don’t have to resort to major savings programs at the slightest headwind.”
Maximizing efficiencies across the organization is something Tesla CEO Elon Musk has long talked about. By “building the machine that builds the machine“, Tesla looks to utilize an army of manufacturing robots to achieve mass volume production of its product line that consists of vehicles, solar products and battery storage solutions. It’s the company’s key differentiator over other manufacturers that largely have robots augmenting human personnel as opposed to replacing them.
The goal to achieve full automation is Tesla’s biggest strength, yet also the company’s weakest link, as made evident when Musk announced that production of its mass market-intent Model 3 vehicle was facing issues. The downside to implementing a highly automated production line is the need to have robots that work in perfect harmony with one another. Any misconfiguration or general issue around a specific machine in the process becomes amplified across all other machines that rely on it. There’s less tolerance for errors in an automated process, explained Musk during the company’s third-quarter earnings call.
Porsche’s strategic entry into a market that’s been largely dominated by Tesla is an interesting match up that pits David versus Goliath. With two very different approaches to reaching mass volume production from two very distinct companies, it’s anyone’s guess who’ll come out ahead in the race to electric mobility. Regardless, competition helps stimulate innovation, productivity and growth prospects in the electric car sector, and that can only be a good thing.
A new report from Reuters claims that a transport authority in Sweden is pushing back against the approval of Tesla’s Full Self-Driving suite because it will travel over speed limits.
The report says the Swedish Transport Administration (TRV) recommends the European Union votes against FSD’s approval. TRV believes it should not be approved until Tesla disables FSD’s ability to speed.
TRV sent a letter to the European Union’s Technical Committee on Motor Vehicles (TCMV), which is set to meet on June 30 to discuss the potential approval of the Tesla FSD suite in the country. Tesla, which has received various approvals in Europe over the past two months, has not provided a comment.
Teslas operating on FSD do travel over the speed limit, depending on the Speed Profile that is chosen. Drivers have the ability to disengage FSD at any point; Tesla specifically states that those supervising the suite are responsible for its actions.
Let’s cut to the chase: humans operating any vehicle speed almost daily in the United States. Realistically, speed limits in the U.S. are more frequently treated as speed minimums. However, other countries are different, and driving behaviors are less aggressive.
TRV believes that “allowing automated systems to systematically exceed legal speed limits…risks undermining both the legal framework and the expected safety benefits of vehicle automation,” the report stated. It’s surprising that Tesla has not received this claim from other countries previously.
This could be a good argument to bring Max Speed back, the setting that previously allowed the driver to choose the absolute fastest the car would travel.
This would still put the responsibility of supervision in the hands of the driver. It would allow the driver to choose whether the car would travel over the speed limit or not, acknowledging that they set the speed, and if they get pulled over, there would be no ability to argue it.
However, it does not seem as if this is something Tesla will do, especially considering many U.S. drivers have requested the feature in an effort to eliminate speeding or at least tone it down. The company has not shown any interest in bringing it back.
Tesla has approvals for FSD in Europe in Estonia, Lithuania, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Belgium.
Tesla is going to let you guide Full Self-Driving with Grok in 3 months, CEO Elon Musk confirmed on X.
The response from Musk, which revealed Tesla plans to allow drivers to effectively control the car and its navigation more explicitly using Grok, puts the feature for about September.
A Tesla owner said that Full Self-Driving is great, but owners should be able to “converse with Grok like we can with an Uber driver.” She then used examples like, “Grok, turn right here,” and “Drop us off right here, we’ll walk due to traffic,” and finally,” Drop at entrance first, then park far away.”
Coincidentally, the final piece of dialogue would also mean features like Banish are potentially on the way soon.
This functionality will be there in about 3 months or so
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 18, 2026
Banish is also referred to as “Reverse Summon,” and would enable the car to self-park while dropping occupants off at their destination.
This would be a great way to improve the overall experience while supervising FSD. Navigation is already a major painpoint that many owners complain about. Manual overrides when a maneuver is requested or canceled (like using the turn signal stalk to override a navigation route), do not always work.
The feature could be especially useful in street parking scenarios in a city, where spots are sometimes tough to come by. Many of us who grab dinner in a more populated area will park a street or two over from wherever we’re going, because sometimes you know that’s the best you will get. If a driver using FSD could say, “Hey Grok, turn right here on Queen St. and park in that open spot on the right,” it could save a lot of confusion FSD might have on its own.
Musk teased that a similar feature was “coming” back in February:
Tesla Full Self-Driving set to get an awesome new feature, Elon Musk says
It is certainly surprising that Tesla is doing it at this point. The company’s more recent moves have been more evident of taking control and inputs away from humans and putting them in the AI’s hands more frequently. The biggest example of this was taking away Max Speed in AI4 cars, giving us Speed Profiles, and not having any input on the fastest speed the car will travel.
Of course, giving navigation preferences to Grok is availble already in Teslas, but not at the drop of a hat. Instead, you can suggest a certain route at the beginning of your drive.
Here’s an example of that from December:
🚨🏈 I am taking my parents and Fiancee to the @Ravens game next weekend and asked @Grok to help me route my @Tesla through a specific neighborhood to reach the correct Lot we will park in.
This is a great example of the new @grok nav integration with the Tesla Holiday Update: pic.twitter.com/rPp4I7q8Yv
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) December 13, 2025
Finally, the original post that Musk responded to mentioned a parking preference after dropping off the occupants, which describes the Banish feature that Tesla has teased for years.
We’re not sure if Musk was responding more to the ability to guide the car with Grok, or whether he also was including Banish in the three-month prediction timeframe.
A close-up image of a Cybercab engineering vehicle in Peabody, Massachusetts, reveals a compact triangular side repeater camera housing equipped with an integrated washer mechanism.
This seemingly small hardware addition could prove to be one of the most critical components for achieving reliable, unsupervised Full Self-Driving (FSD) — not just for the dedicated Robotaxi but potentially for existing AI4-equipped vehicles as well.
The washer system’s importance cannot be overstated in Tesla’s vision-only autonomy approach. Cameras are the sole sensory input for the neural networks powering FSD, constantly interpreting the environment for safe navigation. In real-world conditions, however, lenses quickly accumulate rain, snow, mud, dust, or road spray.
Many of us Tesla owners, especially those who deal with any sort of winter weather at all, know the all-too-common alert that pops up when cameras are obstructed:
Even brief obstructions can drop perception confidence, trigger safety disengagements, or force the vehicle to pull over, although these are relatively rare. Instead, most of the time, the camera will need a wipe from the owner next time they stop the car.
But unlike human drivers who can manually clear their view, a Robotaxi operating 24/7 without a steering wheel or mirrors must maintain pristine vision autonomously. The Cybercab’s side repeater washer delivers targeted cleaning bursts precisely where needed for merging, lane changes, and blind-spot monitoring — functions that demand uninterrupted visibility from the external cameras:
And this is how the side camera and washer look like on a Cybercab. This is from an Engineering vehicle in Peabody MA. pic.twitter.com/Re8VknpmLM
— Tobias Goebel (Unsupervised) (@tpgoebel) June 17, 2026
This hardware directly tackles a known pain point in current FSD deployments. Owners frequently report camera-related alerts during inclement weather, which is understandable, but needs to be solved for a true autonomous experience.
For a production Robotaxi fleet aiming for high utilization and minimal downtime, robust washer systems represent a foundational reliability upgrade; essentially, they’re a must-have. Early sightings suggest the design may extend to rear cameras as well, creating a comprehensive cleaning architecture that keeps the entire vision suite operational in harsh environments.
Without it, even the most advanced neural nets struggle when their “eyes” are compromised.
What Does This Mean for AI4 Cars?
This Cybercab detail raises timely questions for AI4 cars already on the road. While Hardware 4 delivers superior compute and camera resolution compared to earlier versions, production models typically lack dedicated side and rear washers. Tesla has included them on Model Y robotaxis that it is using in the fleet:
Tesla Robotaxi has a highly-requested hardware feature not available on typical Model Ys
As Tesla refines unsupervised FSD for broader release, the gap in environmental resilience becomes evident. Software improvements can help mitigate issues, but they cannot fully replace physical cleaning in heavy rain or muddy conditions. Analysts and owners increasingly speculate that AI4 vehicles may eventually require similar washer retrofits — or a future AI4.5 variant — to match the Cybercab’s all-weather readiness and support the same level of autonomy.
As testing progresses, the Cybercab’s washer mechanism highlights Tesla’s pragmatic focus on real-world robustness. It may well become the hardware piece that determines how quickly and reliably FSD scales from prototypes to everyday vehicles.
Tesla faces Full Self-Driving pushback in EU over ‘speeding’
Tesla teases greater Grok FSD integration and ‘Banish’ feature ‘in about 3 months’
