- Elon Musk said in a recent panel that humanoid robots will unlock “quasi-infinite” services.
- The Tesla CEO said he wasn’t sure if money would have much value by then.
- Tesla is starting production of its Optimus robots in 2025, according to Musk.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk said in a recent interview with Dubai’s World Governments Summit that the economic returns of artificial intelligence investments will be seen in humanoid robots.
Speaking to the UAE’s AI minister, Omar Sultan Al Olama, in a video call on Thursday, Musk said that humanoid robots and deep intelligence will unlock the global economy’s potential by providing “quasi-infinite products and services.”
Musk was responding to Al Olama’s question on where he believes the “biggest economic returns” of AI models will come from.
“You can produce any product, provide any service,” Musk said of humanoid robots. “There’s really no limit to the economy at that point. You can make anything.”
The billionaire said that money may not carry much value by then.
“Will money even be meaningful? I don’t know; it might not be,” he said, adding that robots could create a “universal high-income situation” because anyone will have the ability to make as many goods and services as they want.
Musk’s bullishness on humanoid robots comes as no surprise. The CEO said during an earnings call on January 29 that Tesla will begin production of “several thousand” Optimus robots by the end of 2025.
“It’s one of those things where I think, long term, Optimus has the potential to be north of $10 trillion in revenue,” he said during the call. “Like, it’s really bananas.”
Musk has been known to overshoot timelines for delivery dates, including on the Cybercab robotaxis. The CEO once said that Tesla would have a million robotaxis on the road by 2020. Then in 2022, he pushed that timeline to 2023.
While Musk said in the company’s most recent earnings call that Tesla will begin providing autonomous ride-hailing services in Austin by June, the Cybercab, Tesla’s dedicated robotaxi car, won’t begin volume production until 2026, according to its earnings presentation.
Tesla isn’t the only player betting on humanoid robots.
Meta is creating a product group focused on robots and announced on Friday that former Cruise CEO Marc Whitten would spearhead the team, according to an internal memo obtained by Business Insider.
A Tesla spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.
