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Elon Musk: We Are Less Than Two Years From Complete Car Autonomy

This article is more than 7 years old.

Elon Musk is known for his optimistic deadlines, but this one is very aggressive.

The Tesla CEO spoke at the Code Conference on Wednesday night and predicted that we're closer to self-driving cars than anybody thinks. "I think we are less than two years away from complete autonomy, safer than humans, but regulations should take at least another year," Musk said.

While many auto and tech companies--from Google to Uber and GM to Lyft and Apple to Ford--are researching and testing autonomous vehicles, the Tesla seems on the verge of announcing that its Model 3 consumer sedan will have full self-driving capabilities.

Musk did not confirm that feature, but when asked multiple times on stage, he replied that there would be another Tesla event later in the year in which he would have more details. The only thing he would say is that Tesla would do "the obvious thing"--seemingly a reference to a prior comment he made about autonomous driving being a must have feature for future vehicles.

Musk also took a crack at Apple, the computer maker widely rumored to be building a car. Musk estimated that Apple wouldn't be able to start mass production until 2020 at the earliest, which he called a "missed opportunity," suggesting they should have started the project earlier. No one knows that better than Musk, who has been working on Tesla for 13 years and still is hounded by major production delays as he tries to scale the business.

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