News
Tesla starts hiring ramp for Gigafactory Texas engineers, HR
Around the same time Giga Texas’ construction kicked off 24/7 shifts, Tesla started a hiring ramp for its Gigafactory in Austin. A local news report stated that the EV automaker is already looking for an HR manager for the upcoming Cybertruck factory. Tesla has also recently posted a couple new engineering jobs on its career page, all of which are located in Austin, Texas.
The Austin Business Journal published a job position for an experienced HR Manager for Tesla Giga Texas. The description for the job was very colorful and asked for a specific kind of individual for the position. “Check your ego at the door. We don’t allow them on the property,” it said.
“We care about people, growth, excellence and results. We tend to lose sleep over them as this is not easy. Bottom line, we are in search of real people that believe in and deliver the impossible every day. You must love and thrive in that fast paced, high energy chaotic environment.”
The responsibilities of Gigafactory Texas’s HR Manager included: “Making the impossible possible,” and “Love to be challenged, REALLY CHALLENGED!” The tone and diction of the job description spoke volumes about the kind of work environment Tesla will create for Giga Texas employees.
Besides an HR Manager, Tesla’s Careers page revealed that the company is looking for engineers to work at its Austin-based Gigafactory as well, particularly a Quality Engineer, Controls Engineer, and Manufacturing Equipment Engineer. Job posts for all three of the engineering positions were posted on November 13.
All three of the engineering jobs fall under the “Manufacturing” category, which may be quite telling. Teslarati previously reported that Giga Texas started working three shifts in an effort to accelerate the construction of it production facilities. During Tesla’s “Travis County Colorado River Project Partner Pre-Qualification Presentation,” the EV automaker estimated Giga Texas’s first dry-in would be December 30, 2020.
If it meets the set date for the dry-in, Tesla could start Cybertruck trial production sooner than expected, giving the company ample time to iron out all the kinks of the EV pickup truck’s manufacturing process. An HR Manager as well as engineers for quality, manufacturing equipment, and control would probably be needed during the vehicle’s trial production phase.
Based on the recent developments in Giga Texas, Tesla does seem to be maintaining its schedule for Cybertruck and Model Y production in Austin. If successful, Giga Texas could play a part in Tesla’s Q3 and Q4 numbers in 2021, most especially its production target for next year. For 2020, Tesla set a guidance of 500,000 vehicles, which the electric car manufacturer seems relatively confident it has a chance of meeting.
Tesla hasn’t formally set a production and delivery goal for 2021 yet, but it will definitely exceed its 500,000 guidance of 2020. Recently, Giga Shanghai’s 2021 goals were leaked and revealed Tesla China set a 550,000 guidance for 2021. If Giga Shanghai can produce half a million vehicles alone, Tesla’s production could easily double next year. Giga Texas’ Model Y and Cybertruck production could help Tesla produce 1 millions vehicles in one year, along with the Fremont Factory, Giga Shanghai, and Giga Berlin.
Tesla revealed a major new Cybercab detail in a guide it released for First Responders, showing new territory in its beliefs and intentions for the ride-hailing-focused vehicle that entered production in April.
The First Responders Guide is released to give fire departments, paramedics, and other emergency personnel the proper guidance on what to do in the event of an accident, entrapment, or other situation that would require immediate attention.
On one of the pages of the First Responders Guide, Tesla revealed a stark detail about the Cybercab, which could help personnel enter the vehicle more easily in case of an emergency.
Tesla Cybercab has one important piece that AI4 cars might need for FSD
It shows Tesla has no intention of releasing any Cybercab units that were initially proposed for ride-hailing services for the general public with any manual controls, meaning a steering wheel or pedals:
“A Cybercab equipped with steering wheel, brake pedal, and an acceleration pedal is typically an engineering or test vehicle, and operates at SAE Level 2 autonomy. Cybercab is not typically equipped with a steering wheel or acceleration and brake pedals.”
New official Cybercab documentation from Tesla:
“A Cybercab equipped with steering wheel, brake pedal, and an acceleration pedal is typically an engineering or test vehicle, and operates at SAE Level 2 autonomy. Cybercab is not typically equipped with a steering wheel or… https://t.co/P6ut1mZyzr pic.twitter.com/yq6skl9s2J
— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) June 27, 2026
This is a major development for those who continue to believe Tesla planned to release the Cybercab with any sort of manual controls so that passengers could take over if needed. However, when Tesla started manufacturing production versions of the Cybercab in Giga Texas earlier this year, they were spotted without a steering wheel or pedals.
It essentially confirms the company has no intentions of bringing manual controls to the car’s production versions. Some have argued that the likelihood of Tesla having something
There still are some Cybercab units out there with a steering wheel and pedals, and as Tesla said, these cars are engineering or test vehicles, which have Safety Monitors on board to help the car out of a precarious situation or emergency.
Tesla released the Full Self-Driving v14 ‘Lite’ suite to owners of Hardware 3 or AI3 vehicles today, adding several new features to the vehicles that were once believed to be capable of unsupervised self-driving.
Now, Tesla has released this modified suite to older Tesla vehicles, adding plenty of new features and capabilities.
Here are the full release notes for the suite:
- Distilled the intelligence from HW4 V14 into HW3. This allows HW3 to directly learn how to handle scenarios using HW4 V14 as a guide. This process unlocks the improvements that have been made to HW4 including Reinforcement Learning (RL) and offline models for HW3.
- Improved both proactive and reactive responsiveness across a wide variety of categories including navigation handling, merges and forks, pedestrian interactions, traffic lights, and vehicle cut-in scenarios.
- Improved general comfort in nominal scenarios through fewer false slowdowns, smoother steering and more consistent lane centering.
- Introduced parking, unparking, and reversing capabilities.
- Added Arrival Options for you to select where FSD should park: in a Parking Lot, on the Street, in a Driveway, or at the Curbside.
- Speed Profiles are now available at all times, to further customize driving style preference.
These improvements, according to Tesla’s Head of AI, Ashok Elluswamy, help distill the driving behavior from AI4’s v14 series into both the camera and compute configurations of AI3.
Tesla Full Self-Driving v14 ‘Lite’ for older cars finally gets released
He added:
“It includes destination options and speed profiles on city roads, but more importantly significantly improved safety. We hope you’ll enjoy it, once the build ships wide.”
FSD v14 Lite is now rolling out to AI3 early-access customers. Based on the feedback, will rollout to more customers over the next few weeks.
This build distills the driving behavior from AI4’s v14 series into both the camera and compute config of AI3. It includes destination…
— Ashok Elluswamy (@aelluswamy) June 29, 2026
Tesla will continue to roll out the v14 Lite suite more widely in the coming weeks, the company said.
Tesla has finally released its Full Self-Driving v14 ‘Lite’ suite for older cars that equip the Hardware 3 or AI 3 chip, which have not been able to handle the newest versions of the company’s driver assistance software.
Tesla officially started releasing the v14 Lite suite to owners in the Early Access Program last night. The company’s Head of AI, Ashok Elluswamy, said that the rollout will continue over the next few weeks. The build distills the driving behavior from AI4’s v14 series into both the camera and compute configurations of an AI3 car.
🚨 Tesla is releasing v14 Lite for AI3 owners who are in early-access
This will give AI3 cars the ability to experience new FSD features like parking preferences. https://t.co/pp6Q5FOKoz pic.twitter.com/tqexMB8SVy
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) June 29, 2026
It also includes a variety of new features that were available to AI4 cars running v14, including:
- Start Self-Driving from Park
- Arrival and Parking Options
- Speed Profiles
The release is highly anticipated because those owners with AI3 vehicles were early adopters into the FSD platform and were promised that their cars would be capable of achieving Full Self-Driving.
However, Tesla CEO Elon Musk admitted during the company’s recent Q1 Earnings Call that these vehicles would not be capable of achieving unsupervised Full Self-Driving, which is what Tesla had originally said.
Owners were not pleased with this answer, or the idea that their commitment to buying the suite outright for thousands of dollars would not yield the ability to drive without operating the car. Tesla gave some solutions for this, including a discount on a new car, or an upgrade to an AI4 or AI5 self-driving computer and new, upgraded cameras.
Tesla owners do not seem pleased with these options, as they require giving the company more money.
Nevertheless, it is important to note that Tesla came through for owners here by releasing v14 Lite before the end of Q2, something it had promised owners during the previous Earnings Call. Tesla has had trouble keeping up with timelines, but this is a big achievement for the team.
Tesla reveals huge Cybercab detail in new guide for First Responders
Tesla Full Self-Driving v14 ‘Lite’ Release Notes: new capabilities and features
