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Elon Musk’s warm reception in China is a wake-up call to Tesla’s skeptics
A couple of days after holding the groundbreaking ceremony of Gigafactory 3 in Shanghai, Elon Musk met with Chinese Premier Li Keqiang in Beijing. Li, widely regarded as China’s #2 after President Xi Jinping, spoke candidly with Musk, discussing his optimism about Gigafactory 3 and the innovations that Tesla can bring to the table by producing its electric cars in the Asian economic superpower.
Tesla’s skeptics would best be worried at this point. Musk, after all, continually faces a barrage of criticism — some warranted, most unwarranted — from the United States’ mainstream media and groups of individuals who stand to gain from the company’s decline. This is particularly notable in platforms such as Twitter, which sees daily debates between the TSLA community, who support Musk and his ventures, and the TSLAQ group, who oppose the serial tech entrepreneur. In the United States, at least, Tesla is a widely polarizing company, and Elon Musk is a favorite target for those who oppose his work and what he stands for.
This does not seem to be the case in China. During his talk with the Chinese Premier, Musk openly noted that the country’s speed of development and efficiency are impressive. As pointed out in a China Government Network report, Musk said that “Tesla will strive to build the Shanghai factory into the world’s most advanced factories.” When asked by Li what Musk meant by “most advanced,” the CEO noted that the description would be true for both Gigafactory 3 itself and the vehicles that it would manufacture. Musk further noted that he is hoping to make the Shanghai Gigafactory a global example of a facility that functions almost like a “living being.” Later on, the Chinese premier welcomed Musk’s ideas, even comparing the Tesla CEO to the late Steve Jobs, who revolutionized the mobile industry with the iPhone.
“If you do have this idea, then we can issue you a ‘Chinese Green Card.’ Your idea is similar to Apple’s founder Steve Jobs. Steve Jobs is inspired by the oriental Zen culture originated from China and optimized the interface of Apple’s mobile phone,” Li said.
After breaking ground in Shanghai, Tesla CEO @elonmusk had a meeting with China's Premier Li Keqiang at Tower of Violet Light (中南海紫光阁) in Beijing China 🇨🇳 . $TSLA #Tesla #China #TeslaChina pic.twitter.com/CHREQXcEyM
— vincent (@vincent13031925) January 9, 2019
It should be noted that Elon Musk and the Chinese Premier held a meeting at the Tower of Violet Light in Beijing — a place usually reserved for the country’s most distinguished guests. In a way, it is no exaggeration to state that Musk received a welcome worthy of a foreign dignitary by the Chinese government. Considering that Musk is a foreign automaker CEO, such warm reception does indicate the country’s open support for Tesla and Gigafactory 3.
In a way, Tesla’s presence in Shanghai is beneficial to the country. China, after all, is aggressively pushing the adoption of renewable energy, and among its initiatives is a significant shift towards electric mobility. In this light, having well-known and daring innovators such as Elon Musk on the country’s side would help China reach its ambitious goals, one of which is to sell 7 million electric or hybrid vehicles annually by 2025. In a statement to Xinhua News, Cui Dongshu, secretary general of the China Passenger Car Association described Elon Musk and the Gigafactory 3’s effect on the Chinese EV industry.
“Tesla’s China production will have a ‘catfish effect’ in the country’s auto industry, pushing domestic carmakers to speed up their technological upgrading,” Cui said.
That said, the United States media has recently begun adopting a somewhat friendlier stance on Musk and Tesla. While there is still a healthy stream of negative articles about the company and its CEO, some notable personalities from mainstream media such as CNBC’s Becky Quick appear to be turning a new page. During a segment featuring fellow CNBC host Phil LeBeau in Gigafactory 1, for one, Quick admitted that she does tend to “short-change” Elon Musk.
“We tend to kinda short-change Elon Musk with all the things he’s done with the Gigafactory, Tesla, the rockets, The Boring Company. Seeing it in action gives you a slightly different perspective, I would guess,” she said.
“I hope to make the @Tesla Shanghai factory a global example.” #Tesla CEO @elonmusk said, “I love China very much and I am willing to come here more.”
"If you do have this idea, we can issue you a 'China Green Card'." Premier Li Keqiang said. $TSLA https://t.co/pm8KWlqiyH pic.twitter.com/T43uIBkQ6X— vincent (@vincent13031925) January 10, 2019
Fox Business‘ Stuart Varney, one of Musk’s more vocal critics in the past, has also taken a friendlier stance on the Tesla and SpaceX CEO. Addressing his audience, Varney noted that it is now time to “re-evaluate” Elon Musk.
“I think it’s time for a re-evaluation. I think it’s time to look at the man’s achievements, rather than his public image. Like him or not, Elon Musk is surely the prime example of a brilliant entrepreneur. He makes state-of-the-art electric cars. He had the vision. A lot of people talk about their “vision,” but he went out and did it. You’ve heard of SpaceX. That’s an Elon Musk company. He had a vision for reusable rockets, and he went out and did that, too… That’s an achievement.
“You’ve heard of the Boring Company… This is Musk’s contribution to future mass transit. The point is, he did it. He just offered a tour of the tunnel he’s already built in southern California. It’s not just talk. In the age of social media, we tend to fixate on the negatives. It’s easy to pour scorn on someone who behaves like Elon Musk. But step back, and look at what he has actually done: He’s in the car business, the space business, the mass transit business. He’s got a product in all three industries. That is tangible success. Give the man credit.”
There is little doubt that Elon Musk is one of the world’s most notable innovators today. If the reception he received during Gigafactory 3’s groundbreaking is any indication, it appears that he is well-supported in China. It remains to be seen if this same reception would be extended in the country Musk currently calls his home.
As for Musk’s skeptics, this might be a very bad time to bet against the man.
Tesla AI lead Ashok Elluswamy said this week that 24-hour Robotaxi service is close. Replying on X to a rider who wanted Cybercab trips all night, he wrote that the capability would arrive “next month or so” once “the next tech to merge on the v15 plan” is ready.
The comment landed on September 4, one day after Tesla opened public Cybercab rides in Austin. It is the clearest near-term timeline yet for overnight unsupervised operation. Tesla’s paid Robotaxi network currently runs from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. seven days a week across Austin, Dallas, Houston, Miami, Orlando, and Tampa.
next month or so. the next tech to merge on the v15 plan will enable it.
— Ashok Elluswamy (@aelluswamy) September 4, 2026
That 16-hour window is shorter than the 6 a.m. to 2 a.m. schedule the company used for much of the prior year.
Elluswamy did not name the specific feature or say whether the change would apply first to purpose-built Cybercabs, the existing Model Y fleet, or both. He also offered no city-by-city rollout list. The link to Full Self-Driving v15 is nevertheless significant.
Tesla has described v15 as a step-change architecture with seven parallel improvement tracks and roughly ten times more parameters than earlier builds. Early versions of that software already operate on the Robotaxi fleet and contain about 40 percent of the planned gains.
By July 2026, the unsupervised fleet had logged more than 380,000 miles across six cities in two states with what the company called an impeccable safety record and no notable incidents caused by the vehicles themselves. Tesla has repeatedly argued that camera-based end-to-end neural networks, rather than extra sensors, are the core of the solution.
Overnight service would test that claim in lower-light conditions and would also raise vehicle utilization, a key variable for Robotaxi unit economics. The company has already begun using public Superchargers at night and is building dedicated Robotaxi charging sites.
Riders have asked why software must change if the cars already drive in the dark. The practical answer appears to be reliability and scale: Tesla has held back mass expansion until more of the v15 stack is merged, citing the need for higher confidence before putting thousands of unoccupied vehicles on streets around the clock.
If the next module arrives on the timetable Elluswamy sketched, 24-hour service could begin in October 2026 in at least some markets.
That would mark a shift from a daytime-bounded pilot to a service that can run whenever demand exists, including the late-night hours that have so far remained out of reach.
Tesla is beginning to roll out Full Self-Driving Supervised v14.3.9 with a new active safety layer that can take control even when the driver is operating the car manually.
Tesla AI said the software can activate FSD on the driver’s behalf when an imminent collision is detected and Automatic Emergency Braking may not be enough. It may also engage if the system detects heavy distraction or an accidental FSD disengagement.
FSD Supervised v14.3.9 starting to roll out shortly
This release includes a new active safety feature set: FSD Supervised can now activate on your behalf when an imminent collision is detected and Automatic Emergency Braking (AEB) may not be enough.
It may also engage if we…
— Tesla AI (@Tesla_AI) September 4, 2026
The capability is essentially Automatic Collision Evasion. However, unlike conventional AEB, which mainly applies the brakes in a straight line, this feature can use steering, braking, and acceleration together if the car calculates that stopping alone will not prevent impact and a safer path exists. The system may change lanes or move toward a shoulder when conditions allow, then continue driving after the immediate threat is handled rather than simply coming to a stop.
The intervention is meant as a last-resort safety net, not a replacement for attentive driving.
Tesla Full Self-Driving v14.3.7 early review: FSD saved me from an accident
Tesla’s own description still frames FSD as supervised assistance. Secondary reports on internal release notes say the feature can fire while the car is being driven manually if cabin-camera monitoring suggests the driver is not sufficiently attentive, such as reaching toward the back seat, or if FSD appears to have been turned off unintentionally.
After the emergency maneuver, the car is expected to alert the driver and request a return to manual control.
The safety case is straightforward. Many collisions happen in the last second because a driver is looking away, fumbles a control, or faces an obstacle that braking cannot fully solve. A system that can both recognize that AEB is insufficient and execute a coordinated evasive path can reduce those remaining high-severity events.
Re-engaging after accidental disengagement also addresses a practical failure mode: a small steering nudge that drops FSD at the worst moment. The advantage is a background safety net that uses the same vision stack already running in v14, instead of leaving the car solely to emergency braking once the driver is no longer in command.
The feature still depends on FSD being enabled and, according to reports, an active FSD purchase or subscription. It does not make the vehicle unsupervised. Drivers remain responsible, and Tesla has not published how often the system is expected to intervene or how it will handle false positives.
If the rollout is conservative and the false-alarm rate stays low, the update is a meaningful step: FSD is no longer only a feature the driver turns on. In the rare moments when disaster is already forming, it can step in.
Tesla launched the all-electric, steering wheel-less, and pedal-less Cybercab last night at a quiet and small event in downtown Austin, Texas.
The launch, which marked the beginning of unsupervised ride-hailing for Tesla’s Robotaxi platform with Cybercab, has already caught the attention of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) who has more questions.
NHTSA opened an Audit Query (AQ) into the Cybercab’s Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS) certification that Tesla gave the vehicle. Manufacturers self-certify vehicles much of the time to avoid excessive regulatory delays.
Tesla Cybercab interior, note the lack of steering wheel and pedals. (Credit: @niccruzpatane/X< /a>)
However, the agency needs more information; it said in a summary:
“On September 3, 2026, Tesla began commercial deployment with a small number of its Cybercab vehicles in Austin, Texas. Tesla notified the Agency that it certified those Cybercab vehicles as compliant with all applicable Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS). Tesla also notified the Agency that it plans to gradually expand commercial deployment of the Cybercab to include additional vehicles and locations.”
It also went on to state that the Cybercab lacks traditional automotive controls, which is a groundbreaking move. The process is entirely new to the NHTSA, which gives the agency some leverage to put Tesla’s launch under a microscope:
“The vehicles lack permanently attached, conventional manual controls, such as a brake pedal, gas pedal, steering wheel, and mirrors. NHTSA is opening this AQ to examine the process and technical data on which Tesla relied when certifying the Cybercab and related issues. Among other things, NHTSA will consider the extent to which Tesla’s certification depended on determinations that certain FMVSS are inapplicable to the Cybercab.”
Tesla has added 45 Cybercab units to its fleet of Robotaxi-enabled cars in Austin, according to public documents the company submitted to the State of Texas over the past week. Enabling this level of self-driving is something Tesla has worked toward for many years, and now that it is finally here, it seems more than reasonable that regulatory agencies will have some questions.
Many outlets might try to frame this as a negative, but it is truly an agency looking to gain more information about groundbreaking tech that Tesla has been developing for years.
In an effort to keep riders, pedestrians, and property safe, any and all data accumulated from these first days, weeks, and months of rides will likely be shared with the NHTSA to enable broader rollout strategies across the United States and more in the future.
Tesla Robotaxi will be a 24/7 service: here’s when
Tesla Full Self-Driving will now overtake manual driving to avoid disaster
