Since its inception, Tesla’s humanoid robot Optimus has been carrying Elon Musk’s ambition to reshape future production and daily life, and is seen as another growth engine after Tesla’s automotive and energy businesses. Whether in the envisioned Mars exploration or large-scale commercial applications, Optimus carries the expectations of global tech enthusiasts. However, the road to development has not been smooth. Recently, the suspension of component procurement has sparked industry discussions, reflecting Tesla’s difficult balancing act between technological breakthroughs and mass production.
Procurement Suspension, Plan Change
Recently, news from the Chinese supply chain has drawn wide attention in the tech and automotive industries: Tesla has suspended the procurement of components for its humanoid robot Optimus. This decision was not without warning. As early as half a month ago, Tesla began to focus on adjusting the software and hardware technical details of Optimus. This move indicates that Tesla has decided to pause the mass production process and take time to further optimize the product.
By the end of May this year, Tesla had procured enough components to produce 1,200 units of Optimus and had already completed the production of nearly 1,000 units. However, Musk had previously ambitiously promised to produce 5,000 units of Optimus this year. Now, with the interruption in component procurement, this target seems almost out of reach. This has not only sparked speculation about Tesla’s robot program but also made the entire industry reassess the challenges and difficulties in mass-producing humanoid robots.
This adjustment can be traced back to early June when Milan Kovac, the original head of the Optimus project, left the company. Following this, Ashok Elluswamy, Tesla’s Vice President of AI Software, took over the project. Elluswamy hopes to make comprehensive improvements to the design before pushing forward with mass production to ensure that Optimus becomes more mature and stable technically.
Facing Challenges, Technological Breakthroughs
On the hardware side, Optimus is currently facing many urgent issues that need to be resolved. Some joint motors tend to overheat, which not only affects the robot’s ability to work continuously but may also negatively impact the motor’s lifespan. The dexterous hand, which is a key component for Optimus to perform delicate tasks, has a relatively low load capacity, limiting the robot’s ability to operate in some scenarios that require more force. Additionally, the short lifespan of the transmission system and insufficient battery life are also challenges that the Tesla team must overcome.
To address these issues, Tesla is actively seeking technological breakthroughs. In the development of the dexterous hand, Tesla is still collaborating with multiple suppliers, exploring different technical solutions. Currently, at least three different technical solutions are being tested, and Tesla hopes that through this diversified exploration, it can find the most suitable solution for Optimus’s dexterous hand to improve its load capacity and precision in operations.
On the software side, Tesla plans to use more synthetic data to train the robot models. By using synthetic data, Tesla can simulate various complex scenarios and tasks, allowing Optimus to undergo extensive training in virtual environments, thus improving its autonomous operation ability and increasing the success rate of completing complex actions. This approach not only reduces the cost and risks of actual testing but also accelerates Optimus’s learning process, enabling it to adapt faster to various real-world scenarios.
Although Musk recently stated on social media that the new version of Optimus has shown significant performance improvements compared to the second-generation product revealed in 2023 and has added Grok-supported voice interaction features, Optimus still faces technological hurdles before achieving large-scale commercial applications.
A Promising Future, But More Effort Needed
According to Musk’s grand plan, Tesla will produce 50,000 units of Optimus and begin selling them next year. By 2027, Optimus will be launched into space aboard SpaceX’s Starship to start its journey of interplanetary exploration. By 2029, the annual production of Optimus is expected to exceed 500,000 units. However, this plan has already undergone adjustments. Musk originally envisioned ramping up Optimus’s annual production capacity to 1 million units by 2027, but this target has now been scaled back.
Tesla has already invested a significant amount of resources in the humanoid robot field, collaborating with hundreds of supply chain companies on three years of hardware development, and has built a complete humanoid robot supply chain. The Optimus R&D team had already exceeded 400 people by the end of last year. With a unit cost of $60,000, Tesla had originally planned to spend more than $300 million just on component procurement this year.
Sources within the supply chain reveal that Tesla may showcase the third-generation Optimus at this year’s shareholders meeting. For Musk, this is an important opportunity to demonstrate results to Tesla’s shareholders and hundreds of supply chain companies. He needs to prove through showcasing the new product that the Optimus project still holds tremendous potential, encouraging continued investment from all parties to reverse the negative expectations currently held by the capital markets.
Although the suspension of component procurement has brought some setbacks to the short-term progress of the Optimus project, in the long run, this might be a necessary adjustment. By solving current technological problems and optimizing design plans, Tesla could position Optimus more favorably in future market competition. However, to achieve Musk’s grand blueprint, Tesla still needs to invest more effort in technological research and development, cost control, and market promotion.
