After a bruising 2025 for Tesla’s vehicle business, Elon Musk is increasingly pointing to a very different product as the company’s long term centerpiece: the Optimus humanoid robot. The shift comes as Chinese automaker BYD surpassed Tesla to become the world’s top selling electric vehicle brand, tightening pressure on margins just as regulatory and tariff headwinds weigh on global EV demand.
The turning point in rhetoric surfaced at the All In Summit when investor Jason Calacanis suggested Optimus could become so significant that “nobody will remember Tesla ever made a car.” Musk later reacted on X with a brief but telling response: “Probably true.” For a CEO whose company helped drag electric vehicles into the mainstream, the remark signals a notable reprioritization.
Optimus is designed as a general purpose, AI powered humanoid capable of repetitive, physically demanding, or hazardous labor. Tesla has previously floated a target price near $20,000, positioning the robot as a mass market industrial and domestic platform rather than a high end novelty. Musk has repeatedly framed the project as eventually more valuable than Tesla’s entire automotive business.
The robot also sits at the core of Musk’s proposed trillion dollar compensation structure. One major milestone tied to that package requires Tesla to deliver one million Optimus units. Calacanis, who claims he has visited Tesla’s robotics lab, expressed extraordinary confidence in the platform, predicting production could scale into the hundreds of millions over time and calling it potentially the most transformative consumer technology ever developed.
Parallel to Optimus, Tesla is pursuing another ambitious autonomy driven goal: deploying up to one million robotaxis using its upcoming two seat Cybercab. That vehicle is slated for production in April 2026 but still awaits regulatory approval and trademark clearance. Both the Cybercab and Optimus rely heavily on Tesla’s AI and vision systems, tying the company’s future less to cars and more to autonomous machines operating in physical environments.
Still, Musk’s suggestion that Tesla’s automotive legacy could fade is far from guaranteed. Tesla’s early Roadster catalyzed the modern EV era, and its Plaid models remain benchmarks for electric performance. Yet setbacks including Cybertruck struggles, manufacturing quality criticisms, and ongoing scrutiny of Full Self Driving have dented the company’s once untouchable reputation.
Whether Optimus becomes a historic breakthrough or an overextended bet, Tesla is no longer behaving like a car company that happens to experiment with robotics. It increasingly looks like a robotics and AI company that still sells cars, for now.
