Elon Musk wants to use thousands of Optimus robots in Tesla factories, aiming to produce one million units a year by 2030. Still, Chris Walti, who used to lead Tesla’s Optimus robot team, has expressed doubts about how useful humanoid robots are in factories.
Walti told Business Insider that humanoid robots are interesting, but they are not well suited to the fast and repetitive tasks found in manufacturing. He said, “It’s not the best way to go,” and explained that simpler robots built for warehouses are more efficient.
Walti, who worked on Optimus and led the mobile robotics team during the Model 3 rush, believes robotics is not yet ready for large-scale use of humanoid robots. He said humanoid robots are like a tough situation in the ninth inning, while robotics as a whole is still in the early stages of the third inning.
Even with his worries, Musk is still pushing Optimus as the main product Tesla will focus on in the future. The robot, which is 5-foot-8 tall, has demonstrated cleaning and dancing, but recent presentations showed that some of its actions were controlled by humans from a distance. Tesla has said that a few Optimus robots are currently working in factories but has not revealed what they do.
In 2022, Walti left Tesla and started Mytra, a company that builds slab-shaped robots for use in industrial logistics. He believes that humanoid robots are more complicated than self-driving cars and are not suitable for doing the same task over and over. “The body developed to avoid predators, not to work in factories,” he explained.
Even though Tesla isn’t the only company working on humanoid robots, Walti’s story makes us wonder if Musk’s plans are truly innovative or just too ambitious.
