Elon Musk says that Tesla’s market cap is directly tied to whether it solves autonomous driving
Chief Executive Officer of SpaceX and Tesla and owner of Twitter, Elon Musk attends the Viva Technology conference dedicated to innovation and startups at the Porte de Versailles exhibition centre on June 16, 2023 in Paris, France.
Chesnot | Getty Images
Tesla CEO Elon Musk thinks the automaker’s market capitalization is directly tied to whether or not the automaker is able to solve autonomous driving, the billionaire told LVMH scion Antoine Arnault Friday.
Musk was speaking at Paris’ VivaTech innovation conference. The younger Arnault ribbed Musk about Tesla’s $827 billion market cap, noting it dwarfed the storied luxury conglomerate’s valuation.
The Tesla CEO responded and suggested he had little insight into stock price movements. “Valuations are a strange thing,” Musk said. “Sometimes I’ve said, ‘Hey, I think the stock price is too high at Tesla,’ and then the stock price goes up. I’m like, ‘okay.'”
But Musk also suggested Tesla’s market cap was tied to whether or not the company could perfect autonomous driving technology.
“Really the value of the company is primarily on the basis of autonomy,” Musk said. “If you look at our total vehicle output, it’s almost 2 million vehicles this year or something like that. But that’s still only 2% of total vehicle production.”
“The potential for autonomy is that the value of autonomy is so high, that even even if you have a discount, a percentage probability of autonomy happening, that is so incredibly valuable,” the CEO continued. He also reiterated the idea of Tesla owners turning their vehicles into a fleet of self-driving robotaxis, an idea which he once said would be implemented by 2020.
Musk has said for several years that Tesla is close to solving autonomous driving, but the company’s cars still only provide advanced driver assistance features.
An electric air taxi by Joby Aviation flies near the Downtown Manhattan Heliport in Manhattan, New York City, U.S., November 12, 2023.
Roselle Chen | Reuters
Air taxi maker Joby Aviation in a new lawsuit accused competitor Archer Aviation of using stolen information by a former employee to “one-up” a partnership deal with a real estate developer.
“This is corporate espionage, planned and premeditated,” Joby said in the lawsuit filed Wednesday in a California Superior Court in Santa Cruz, where the company is based.
Archer and Joby did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment.
The lawsuit alleges that former U.S. state and local policy lead, George Kivork, downloaded dozens of files and sent some content to his personal email two days before he resigned in July to take a job at Archer, which had recruited him.
By August, Joby said a partner that worked with Kivork said it had been approached by Archer with a “more lucrative deal.” Joby alleges that the eVTOL rival’s understanding of “highly confidential” details helped it leverage negotiations.
Joby also said the developer attempted to terminate the agreement, citing a breach of confidentiality.
Kivork refused to return the files when Joby approached him after conducting an investigation, according to the suit. The company also said Archer denied wrongdoing, and would not disclose how it learned about the terms of the agreement or provide results from an internal investigation it allegedly undertook.
The lawsuit comes during a busy period for electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) technology as companies race to gain Federal Aviation Administration certification to start flying commercially. ‘
The sector has also benefitted from President Donald Trump‘s newly minted eVTOL pilot program.
Joby argued in the complaint that it’s “imperative” to protect Joby’s work “from this type of espionage” to promote the sector’s success and ensure fair competition.
Last week, Joby said it completed its first test flight for a hybrid aircraft it’s working on with defense contractor L3Harris. This month, Amazon-backed Beta Technologies, another electric flight company, also went public on the New York Stock Exchange.
Joby shares have more than doubled over the last year, while Archer is up about 68%.
In August 2023, Archer settled a previous legal dispute with Boeing-owned Wisk Aero over the alleged theft of trade secrets. As part of the deal, Archer agreed to use Wisk as its autonomous tech partner.
A hearing is scheduled for March 20, 2026.
Joby and Archer year-to-date stock chart.
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