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Tesla Autopilot veterans launch company to accelerate self-driving development
After working on Tesla’s Autopilot team for 2.5 years, Andrew Kouri and Erik Reed decided to start their own self-driving, AI-based company rightfully named lvl5. Together with iRobot engineer George Tal, lvl5 aims to develop advanced vision software and HD maps for self-driving cars.
Founded in 2016, lvl5 was incubated at renown Silicon Valley incubator Y Combinator and later raised $2 million in seed funding from investor Paul Buchheit, who’s a partner at Y Combinator and creator of Gmail, and Max Altman’s 9Point Ventures.

In just 3 months, lvl5 racked up almost 500,000 miles of US roadway coverage with Payver. (Photo: lvl5)
“Working with lvl5’s founders while they were at Y Combinator, it was clear they have unmatched expertise in computer vision, which is the secret sauce of their solution,” said Buchheit. “I have no doubt this is the team to make self-driving a reality in the near term.”
At the center of lvl5’s technology is their computer vision algorithms. Founder and CTO George Tall previously specialized in computer vision technology at iRobot. In addition to Tall’s experience at iRobot, Kouri and Reed’s experience at Tesla undoubtedly left them with unparalleled expertise in computer vision.
Instead of turning to expensive LiDAR technology, lvl5’s computer vision analyzes its environment for stoplights, signs, potholes, and other objects. The system can be accurate to 10cm, a notable measure considering it’s derived from simple cameras and smartphones. In comparison, LiDAR systems can cost over $80,000 but are accurate to 3cm.
- Each purple trace through the intersection contributes to building the 3D map from a 2D image. For each frame, lvl5’s computer vision technology computes the position of the vehicle relative to other objects in the intersection and create a point cloud that resembles the output from LiDAR. Each white sideways “pyramid” represents the location of a captured frame in the video trace. (Photo: lvl5)
- This image is taken from one of lvl5’s neural nets, which is designed to draw a box around the position of traffic lights in an image. (Photo: lvl5)
- With only two trips through this intersection, lvl5 can start to extract semantic features such as a stop sign. (Photo: lvl5)
- The three founders of lvl5 in front of their SF home. Left to right: Erik Reed, Andrew Kouri, George Tall (Photo: Lvl5)
So how will lvl5 map roadways in the world using their computer vision technology? Smartphones. Well, for now at least. The company has released an app called Payver that allows anyone’s smartphone to collect data while driving and get paid between $.01-$.05 per mile, depending on a number of factors. Users of the app place their phone in a mount on their dashboard and let the app gather driving data.
The data is sent to lvl5’s central hub and processed by their computer vision technology. “Lvl5 is solving one of the biggest obstacles to widespread availability of self-driving technology,” said Max Altman, one of lvl5’s seed round investors and partner at 9Point Ventures. “Without accurate and efficient HD mapping, as well as the computer vision software that enables it, self-driving vehicles will take much longer to reach mass-market. This will delay everything from safer roads to efficient delivery services.”
GIF: lvl5
“We have to make self-driving available worldwide – not just in California,” Co-Founder and CEO Andrew Kouri said in a company statement. “Our approach, which combines computer vision software, crowdsourcing and widely available, affordable hardware, means our technology is accessible and will make self-driving a reality today, rather than five years from now.”
The company has already established pilot programs with major automakers and both Uber and Lyft. Companies will pay lvl5 an initial fee to use the maps, along with a monthly subscription to keep the maps continuously updated. “Through its OEM-agnostic approach, lvl5 will be able to collect significant amounts of mapping data from millions of cars in order to scale the technology for the benefit of drivers and pedestrians around the world,” the company’s press release states.
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Tesla’s Cybercab fleet jumped 8x in a month, with Dallas up next
Tesla confirms its first official Cybercab fleet number as Austin scales fast and Dallas looms.
Tesla says more than 300 Cybercabs are now serving Austin, the first time the company has put an official number on its active Cybercab fleet. The figure came from the Robotaxi account on X on Saturday, which wrote that one month after launch the service had “scaled to 300+ Cybercabs serving Austin – an 8x increase in 30 days.”
Ashok Elluswamy, Tesla’s head of AI software, quoted the post with a line that carried the bigger news. “Two years since the 10/10 Cybercab WeRobot event, the cabs are everywhere in Austin now. Dallas soon,” he wrote. It is the first time Tesla has named the next city for public Cybercab rides.
One month after launch, we’ve scaled to 300+ Cybercabs serving Austin – an 8x increase in 30 days https://t.co/EagJy2JAsm
— Robotaxi (@robotaxi) October 10, 2026
Tesla opened Cybercab rides to the public in Austin on September 4, as Teslarati reported, a day after an invite only launch event. The ramp since then has been steep. Our September 28 report had the fleet at well over 100 units after availability jumped from 58 to 125 in a single week. On Thursday, Tesla added 150 Cybercabs to the Texas automated vehicle registry, lifting its registered count to 319 from 169. The first seven appeared on the registry on August 31.
RobotaxiTracker, a community site that counts vehicles from sightings and state records, listed 275 vehicles in unsupervised service in Austin on Saturday, 105 of them Cybercabs, which is well below Tesla’s figure. Tracker counts can lag official numbers, though Sawyer Merritt noted that Cybercab wait times in Austin stayed short on Saturday evening even with more than 2,000 fans in town for X Takeover.
Regulators are watching the rollout. NHTSA opened an audit query into Tesla’s certification that the Cybercab meets federal safety standards, and sworn answers are due October 30. Tesla reports third quarter earnings on October 21, which gives the company a natural venue to define its fleet numbers and put a date on Dallas.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk roasts India’s billionaire Mukesh Ambani as Starlink fight heats up
Elon Musk sarcastically calls Mukesh Ambani ‘Prime Minister’ as the Starlink India standoff escalates again.
Elon Musk escalated his public fight over Starlink’s launch in India on Friday, addressing Reliance chairman Mukesh Ambani as “Prime Minister Ambani” in a sarcastic post on X. “Please accept my humble apologies for not realizing that you are the real boss of India,” Musk wrote, before accusing Ambani of “monopolistic exploitation” and asking whether he would “consider allowing Starlink to compete.” In follow up posts, he said Starlink has proven essential during natural disasters and would help parts of India with no internet access.
The post came two days into a fight that Musk sparked up on Wednesday, when he said Starlink was “being blocked by certain oligarchs in order to maintain their monopolistic chokehold on the Indian people.” He called it “a crime against the people of India” and left the names out, adding only, “You can guess who they are.” Jio and Airtel together hold more than 80% of India’s telecom market. On Thursday, Musk asked whether Ambani is “the real boss of India” and said Starlink has spent five years complying with “every single law and requirement” of the Indian government.
Dear Prime Minister Ambani,
Please accept my humble apologies for not realizing that you are the real boss of India.
Naturally, you would prefer to maintain your monopolistic exploitation of the great people of India, but would you nonetheless consider allowing Starlink to compete?
There are many areas of India, as there are in all countries, with no Internet access, which denies children the opportunity for education and for small businesses the opportunity to sell their goods to a global market. Starlink would change their lives for the better.
Thank you 🙏
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 9, 2026
India’s government has pushed back each time. The Ministry of Communications called the suggestion that its framework is unfair or discriminatory “baseless and misconceived.” Communications Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia said Friday that three companies hold satcom licenses: Starlink, Jio Satellite Communications, and Bharti backed Eutelsat OneWeb. Amazon’s Kuiper, now Amazon Leo, is still going through the process. None can launch until regulators finalize satellite spectrum pricing and the Home Ministry signs off on each company’s security compliance. Scindia said the telecom regulator and the Department of Telecommunications are close to a decision on pricing, The Hindu reported. Bharti chairman Sunil Mittal also said OneWeb is still waiting on approvals.
Starlink received its operator license in 2025 after a three year wait, and the space regulator IN-SPACe granted what industry executives called the last approval needed in July. The holdup since then centers on security, particularly concern that foreign operators could bypass Indian gateways.
Musk and Ambani have been on opposite sides of this before. In late 2024, Ambani argued for auctioning satellite spectrum, which Musk criticized as out of step with the rest of the world, and India chose administrative allocation instead. By March 2025, the two sides had signed a deal to sell Starlink devices in Reliance stores, and Starlink secured its telecom license that June. That partner is now also a competitor. Jio is reportedly weighing a constellation of 1,600 to 1,650 satellites costing an estimated $10 billion to $15 billion, while Akash Ambani has told shareholders Jio plans to lease capacity from global providers to move quickly.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk’s surprise addition to the X Takeover lineup has fans talking
Elon Musk will join Saturday’s X Takeover at Giga Texas for a live virtual interview.
Elon Musk will join X Takeover at Giga Texas on Saturday for a live virtual interview, according to Sawyer Merritt, who shared the news late Thursday. Musk will not be on stage in Austin. The conversation is set to stream for free on the @teslaownersSV account on X.
Organizers had kept expectations in check. In a September update, Tesla Owners Silicon Valley said Musk had appeared at the event twice before but was not promising a third appearance, even as fans hoped he would walk the Giga Texas grounds in person. A virtual spot matches 2024, when Musk gave a surprise interview of about an hour to the crowd in San Luis Obispo, as Teslarati reported at the time.
Wasn’t expecting this 🫡
— Tesla Owners Silicon Valley (@teslaownersSV) October 9, 2026
This year’s edition is a first in several ways. It is the first X Takeover held outside California and the first at a Tesla facility, with tickets selling out in eight days. Tesla provides the venue, but the event is produced independently by Tesla Owners Silicon Valley. The main event runs from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. CT, followed by a drone and light show at 9 p.m. Maye Musk is the keynote speaker, Franz von Holzhausen is set for a virtual keynote, and Nicki Minaj is the special guest. Joe Tegtmeyer, whose drone footage Teslarati used to track the Optimus factory steel frame at Giga Texas, is also on the speaker list.
Musk’s interview topics have not been revealed, but the backdrop is busy. Tesla doubled its Cybercab fleet in Austin in late September, and last week Musk explained why Robotaxi hours only moved from 10 p.m. to 11 p.m.. Merritt also reported Thursday that Texas DMV records now show 319 registered Cybercabs, up from 169. NHTSA’s deadline for Tesla’s sworn answers on Cybercab certification is October 30, and Tesla reports third quarter earnings on October 21.
Fans who cannot make it to Austin can watch the livestream on X. Musk tends to say more in unscripted settings than he does in prepared remarks, which is the reason this one is worth having open on Saturday.


