At the quarterly reporting event, Tesla CEO Elon Musk touched on the topic of export restrictions, but while he assessed the impact of US import duties on the automaker’s business as minimal among competitors, he called China’s export restrictions a serious obstacle to organizing the production of Optimus humanoid robots.
Until now, it was believed that Tesla would launch serial production of these robots at the main event in Texas, which is located near the company’s headquarters, but this week it became known that the pilot production of Optimus will first be deployed in California. According to Musk, restrictions on the supply of rare earth metals from China make it difficult for Tesla to produce magnets, which are needed to create robots. The company, according to its head, has begun working on this issue with the Chinese authorities and hopes to receive an export license allowing it to buy rare earth elements from China. To do this, it is necessary to prove that the final products will not be used for military purposes.
China imposed such restrictions this month as part of its response to the U.S. raising tariffs on Chinese imports. “China is asking for some assurances that they are not being used for military purposes, which is obvious. They are just being used in a humanoid robot,” Musk explained.
He also emphasized that the future of Tesla’s business depends to a large extent on autonomous cars and robots: “The future of the company is based on a large fleet of autonomous cars and large quantities of autonomous humanoid robots, produced in large volumes.” Musk previously stated that Tesla intends to produce about 5,000 Optimus robots by the end of this year. The company initially planned to use them at its own auto assembly plants. Even taking into account export restrictions from China, the company is still convinced that it will be able to produce several thousand robots this year and find a use for them at its enterprises.