News
SpaceX Falcon 9 launch and landing imminent as drone ship heads to sea
SpaceX’s next Falcon 9 launch and landing is well into the late stages of preparation, leaving the company approximately 24-48 hours away from its next mission to orbit. To support the surprise ocean landing, a drone ship has already been dispatched and recently departed Port Canaveral.
After a frenetic week of preparation, tugboat Hawk departed with drone ship Of Course I Still Love You (OCISLY) on December 1st, preparing for its second recovery attempt in roughly three weeks and SpaceX’s second drone ship landing after a rare, six-month rocket landing lull. In the days leading up to the anticipated departure, workers could be seen performing a routine procedure often nicknamed a “FOD-walk” in which a given surface is scoured for Foreign Object Debris (FOD). This is most commonly performed on runways (including aircraft carriers) and attempts to mitigate or fully prevent damage from rocks and other small debris.
In the case of Falcon booster landings, the rocket’s Merlin 1D engine exhaust velocity is just shy of 3000 m/s (6700 mph), meaning that a tiny rock or leftover rocket piece could almost immediately become a high-subsonic or supersonic projectile in the seconds before touchdown. The drone ship itself is most at risk, but those theoretical projectiles could potentially bank off the platform’s exhaust shields and hit the booster itself, causing far costlier damage.
And hence the FOD-walk pictured above. Once complete, OCISLY was cleared for departure and has since made it about 75% of the way to its planned landing zone coordinates. SpaceX is currently scheduled to launch Cargo Dragon resupply mission CRS-19 on a Falcon 9 rocket no earlier than 12:51 pm EST (16:51 UTC) on December 4th, although a specific weather condition may delay the instantaneous window by 24 hours. Hawk and OCISLY should thus arrive on station one or two days before launch.
As it turns out, this Falcon 9 landing is a bit of mystery: it’s unclear why exactly SpaceX has decided to land the booster at sea instead of the usual Landing Zone recoveries that have followed most recent Cargo Dragon launches. Typically, the low insertion orbit (~200 km x ~390 km) and relatively low mass of Cargo Dragon (less than 10 tons or 22,000 lb) means that Falcon 9 has (literally) tons of propellant left over, giving it the margins needed to flip around, cancel out a huge amount of horizontal velocity, and boost 100+ km (62+ mi) back to shore.
Instead, new Falcon 9 booster B1058 is scheduled to land aboard drone ship OCISLY some 350 km (220 mi) downrange, an unusual distance. For reference, SpaceX’s May 2019 CRS-17 mission is the only time Falcon 9 has landed at sea after a CRS launch since CRS-8, the rocket’s first successful drone ship recovery. That scenario was forced because LZ-1/2 had coincidently been showered in Crew Dragon debris after C201 exploded during testing. Even then, OCISLY was stationed just 20 or so kilometers offshore, meaning that Falcon 9 B1056 still performed a routine Return To Launch Site (RTLS) landing in spirit.
In short, the ~350-km-downrange landing plan suggests that this Cargo Dragon launch may have a much smaller propellant margin than essentially every similar mission preceding it. This could be explained in a few ways. Maybe after Falcon 9 B1050’s surprise landing failure, SpaceX decided that all new Falcon 9 boosters will attempt drone ship landings after their first flight, minimizing the risk to Cape Canaveral in the event of a CRS-16 repeat. Another possibility, Crew Dragon capsule C205 – scheduled to support the spacecraft’s In-Flight Abort (IFA) test late this month or early next – may still be close to the Cape’s Landing Zones, another reason to avoid even the slightest chance of a catastrophic Falcon landing failure.
Finally, it’s also possible that CRS-19 will follow in the footsteps of CRS-18, which sported a prototype Falcon 9 upper stage designed to push the enveloped of its orbital longevity. Falcon 9 B1056 still managed to land at LZ-1 after CRS-18, but a more ambitious follow-on test could potentially require much more propellant, accounting for the drone ship’s position further downrange. With any luck, we’ll find out more later today during SpaceX, NASA, and the US Air Force’s routine pre-launch press conference – stay tuned!
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Tesla has announced it has hit a major milestone with Full Self-Driving subscriptions, shortly after it said it would exclusively offer the suite without the option to purchase it outright.
Tesla announced on Wednesday during its Q4 Earnings Call for 2025 that it had officially eclipsed the one million subscription mark for its Full Self-Driving suite. This represented a 38 percent increase year-over-year.
This is up from the roughly 800,000 active subscriptions it reported last year. The company has seen significant increases in FSD adoption over the past few years, as in 2021, it reported just 400,000. In 2022, it was up to 500,000 and, one year later, it had eclipsed 600,000.
NEWS: For the first time, Tesla has revealed how many people are subscribed or have purchased FSD (Supervised).
Active FSD Subscriptions:
• 2025: 1.1 million
• 2024: 800K
• 2023: 600K
• 2022: 500K
• 2021: 400K pic.twitter.com/KVtnyANWcs— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) January 28, 2026
In mid-January, CEO Elon Musk announced that the company would transition away from giving the option to purchase the Full Self-Driving suite outright, opting for the subscription program exclusively.
Musk said on X:
“Tesla will stop selling FSD after Feb 14. FSD will only be available as a monthly subscription thereafter.”
The move intends to streamline the Full Self-Driving purchase option, and gives Tesla more control over its revenue, and closes off the ability to buy it outright for a bargain when Musk has said its value could be close to $100,000 when it reaches full autonomy.
It also caters to Musk’s newest compensation package. One tranche requires Tesla to achieve 10 million active FSD subscriptions, and now that it has reached one million, it is already seeing some growth.
The strategy that Tesla will use to achieve this lofty goal is still under wraps. The most ideal solution would be to offer a less expensive version of the suite, which is not likely considering the company is increasing its capabilities, and it is becoming more robust.
Tesla is shifting FSD to a subscription-only model, confirms Elon Musk
Currently, Tesla’s FSD subscription price is $99 per month, but Musk said this price will increase, which seems counterintuitive to its goal of increasing the take rate. With that being said, it will be interesting to see what Tesla does to navigate growth while offering a robust FSD suite.
News
Tesla confirms Robotaxi expansion plans with new cities and aggressive timeline
Tesla plans to launch in Dallas, Houston, Phoenix, Miami, Orlando, Tampa, and Las Vegas. It lists the Bay Area as “Safety Driver,” and Austin as “Ramping Unsupervised.”
Tesla confirmed its intentions to expand the Robotaxi program in the United States with an aggressive timeline that aims to send the ride-hailing service to several large cities very soon.
The Robotaxi program is currently active in Austin, Texas, and the California Bay Area, but Tesla has received some approvals for testing in other areas of the U.S., although it has not launched in those areas quite yet.
However, the time is coming.
During Tesla’s Q4 Earnings Call last night, the company confirmed that it plans to expand the Robotaxi program aggressively, hoping to launch in seven new cities in the first half of the year.
Tesla plans to launch in Dallas, Houston, Phoenix, Miami, Orlando, Tampa, and Las Vegas. It lists the Bay Area as “Safety Driver,” and Austin as “Ramping Unsupervised.”
These details were released in the Earnings Shareholder Deck, which is published shortly before the Earnings Call:
🚨 BREAKING: Tesla plans to launch its Robotaxi service in Dallas, Houston, Phoenix, Miami, Orlando, Tampa, and Las Vegas in the first half of this year pic.twitter.com/aTnruz818v
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) January 28, 2026
Late last year, Tesla revealed it had planned to launch Robotaxi in Las Vegas, Phoenix, Dallas, and Houston, but Tampa and Orlando were just added to the plans, signaling an even more aggressive expansion than originally planned.
Tesla feels extremely confident in its Robotaxi program, and that has been reiterated many times.
Although skeptics still remain hesitant to believe the prowess Tesla has seemingly proven in its development of an autonomous driving suite, the company has been operating a successful program in Austin and the Bay Area for months.
In fact, it announced it achieved nearly 700,000 paid Robotaxi miles since launching Robotaxi last June.
🚨 Tesla has achieved nearly 700,000 paid Robotaxi miles since launching in June of last year pic.twitter.com/E8ldSW36La
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) January 28, 2026
With the expansion, Tesla will be able to penetrate more of the ride-sharing market, disrupting the human-operated platforms like Uber and Lyft, which are usually more expensive and are dependent on availability.
Tesla launched driverless rides in Austin last week, but they’ve been few and far between, as the company is certainly easing into the program with a very cautiously optimistic attitude, aiming to prioritize safety.
Investor's Corner
Tesla (TSLA) Q4 and FY 2025 earnings call: The most important points
Executives, including CEO Elon Musk, discussed how the company is positioning itself for growth across vehicles, energy, AI, and robotics despite near-term pressures from tariffs, pricing, and macro conditions.
Tesla’s (NASDAQ:TSLA) Q4 and FY 2025 earnings call highlighted improving margins, record energy performance, expanding autonomy efforts, and a sharp acceleration in AI and robotics investments.
Executives, including CEO Elon Musk, discussed how the company is positioning itself for growth across vehicles, energy, AI, and robotics despite near-term pressures from tariffs, pricing, and macro conditions.
Key takeaways
Tesla reported sequential improvement in automotive gross margins excluding regulatory credits, rising from 15.4% to 17.9%, supported by favorable regional mix effects despite a 16% decline in deliveries. Total gross margin exceeded 20.1%, the highest level in more than two years, even with lower fixed-cost absorption and tariff impacts.
The energy business delivered standout results, with revenue reaching nearly $12.8 billion, up 26.6% year over year. Energy gross profit hit a new quarterly record, driven by strong global demand and high deployments of MegaPack and Powerwall across all regions, as noted in a report from The Motley Fool.
Tesla also stated that paid Full Self-Driving customers have climbed to nearly 1.1 million worldwide, with about 70% having purchased FSD outright. The company has now fully transitioned FSD to a subscription-based sales model, which should create a short-term margin headwind for automotive results.
Free cash flow totaled $1.4 billion for the quarter. Operating expenses rose by $500 million sequentially as well.
Production shifts, robotics, and AI investment
Musk further confirmed that Model S and Model X production is expected to wind down next quarter, and plans are underway to convert Fremont’s S/X line into an Optimus robot factory with a capacity of one million units.
Tesla’s Robotaxi fleet has surpassed 500 vehicles, operating across the Bay Area and Austin, with Musk noting a rapid monthly expansion pace. He also reiterated that CyberCab production is expected to begin in April, following a slow initial S-curve ramp before scaling beyond other vehicle programs.
Looking ahead, Tesla expects its capital expenditures to exceed $20 billion next year, thanks to the company’s operations across its six factories, the expansion of its fleet expansion, and the ramp of its AI compute. Additional investments in AI chips, compute infrastructure, and future in-house semiconductor manufacturing were discussed but are not included in the company’s current CapEx guidance.
More importantly, Tesla ended the year with a larger backlog than in recent years. This is supported by record deliveries in smaller international markets and stronger demand across APAC and EMEA. Energy backlog remains strong globally as well, though Tesla cautioned that margin pressure could emerge from competition, policy uncertainty, and tariffs.
Tesla hits major milestone with Full Self-Driving subscriptions
Tesla confirms Robotaxi expansion plans with new cities and aggressive timeline
