Tesla CEO Elon Musk claims his company’s Fully Self-Driving driver assistance technology will no longer be “beta” with the next update.
Responding to a Twitter post by Whole Mars Catalogue who said FSD Beta 12 would arrive “probably later this year”, Musk confirmed version 12 of the technology “will not be a beta”.
This shows that the company is confident enough in the technology to no longer want to use the beta tag.
Musk did not confirm when Version 12 will be released. FSD Beta is currently at version 11.3.6.
The system has yet to launch in Australia, where only Autopilot – another Level 2 autonomous driving feature, if less comprehensive – is offered.
The Tesla FSD Beta first rolled out to select US owners in October 2020, before opening in November 2022 to all North American owners who purchased the option.
This feature allows Tesla vehicles to drive autonomously in most driving scenarios. It requires “active driver supervision and do[es] does not make the vehicle autonomous”, according to Tesla’s website.
Building on Autopilot, which includes functions to suggest and execute lane changes and navigate within a lane with adaptive cruise activated, the FSD Beta can identify stop signs and traffic lights and slow down and stop the vehicle accordingly.
Tesla also continues to work on the Autosteer function for city streets.
Musk said in 2019 that by mid-2020 the company would “have over a million Tesla cars on the road with fully self-driving hardware” that drivers can trust to “sleep”.
However, as recently as this February, Tesla was forced to launch an over-the-air update because the FSD Beta “potentially violates local traffic or customs laws when performing certain driving maneuvers”.
Musk said last year he didn’t expect regulatory approval for Tesla’s autonomous driving technology until 2023.
Controversially, even as Tesla pursues increasingly autonomous driving, it has phased out radar and sensors and eschewed LiDAR in favor of its camera-based Tesla Vision system.
Tesla has caused controversy not only for FSD beta testing on public roads, but also for the effectiveness of its Autopilot technology.
The company is reportedly the subject of a criminal investigation from the US Department of Justice, three people familiar with the matter said Reuters last year an investigation was launched following more than a dozen accidents – some fatal – in which Tesla’s Autopilot system was active.
Prosecutors in Washington DC and San Francisco are reportedly examining whether Tesla misled consumers, investors and regulators by making unsupported claims about the capabilities of its driver assistance technology.
The investigation represents a more serious level of scrutiny than previous investigations because it could lead to criminal charges against the company or individual executives, the source said, and the DOJ could also seek civil sanctions.
The company confirmed earlier this year that the DOJ had requested documents about its Autopilot and FSD features.
The Autopilot investigation is currently competing with two other DOJ investigations involving Tesla, a source said Reutersadding that there is still a lot of work to be done and no results are imminent.
This is in addition to two ongoing investigations by the National Highway and Traffic Safety Administration, a US regulator.
One is in the engineering analysis stage and is looking at accidents with stationary emergency vehicles, while the other is looking at reports of ghost brakes.
The agency confirmed it is investigating the 17th fatal crash involving Autopilot, after a Model S collided with a parked fire truck in Contra Costa County, California in February.
Shareholders also recently filed a proposed class action lawsuit against Tesla in federal court in San Francisco, alleging they were misled by the company with false and misleading statements about technology that “creates a risk of serious accidents and injuries”.