Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) CEO Elon Musk, who is known for his unconventional approach, has posted a tweet that says Tesla is serious about developing its autopilot technology for cars, and engineers who are interested in working on self-driving vehicles should contact him, according to Bloomberg.
Musk wrote, “Intense effort under way at Tesla to develop a practical autopilot system for Model S.” “Engineers interested in working on autonomous driving, pls [email protected]. Team will report directly to me.”
Tesla CEO Mr. Non-traditional
Elon Musk has been an eccentric personality and has proved this many times, with the most recent being job postings on twitter, a social media site.
Karl Brauer, senior analyst for Kelley Blue Book in Irvine, California, refers to Elon Musk as “Mr. Non-traditional” in the auto industry, and he seem to loves that image. Him adding the posting requirement on Twitter further gives thrust to that image. Musk believes that autonomous car technology is a rational step in the evolution of cars.
Musk said that autopilot entices him more than self-driving, explaining that self-driving sounds like that the vehicle will do something not desired by the driver, whereas autopilot is a good system in planes and should also be in cars.
Brauer said that Elon Musk has more than 380,000 followers, and the majority will resend Musk’s post about requiring an autopilot engineer, so it will be seen by more people compared to an ad posted in the Los Angeles Times.
Elon Musk is not just tied to Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) but also runs rocket-maker Space Exploration Technologies Corp and is a co-founder of PayPal Inc.
Autonomous vehicle the next big thing
Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) at present holds the market capitalization of $20 billion and is looking forward to achieve the status of the world’s most profitable seller of battery-powered cars by employing in-house technology. It is planning to sell 21,000 Model S cars, which are priced at $70,000 for the entry model. Further, the company aims at selling twice the volume next year in Europe and Asia.
Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG), over the past few years, has echoed its desire to build an autonomous vehicle, and Nissan Motor Co, in a statement last month, said that it would start selling self-driving cars from 2020.
“This is the topic du jour in the auto industry, and Tesla Motors wants to be seen as being part of the movement,” said Karl Brauer.
