Tesla is ‘no longer compute constrained’, running out of excuses for self-driving
Elon Musk says that Tesla is “no longer compute constrained” in its AI training – meaning that it is starting to run out of excuses for not achieving its promised self-driving.
Self-driving is an incredibly difficult and important problem to solve.
Improvements in safety over human drivers could save tens of thousands of lives per year, and cutting down on drive time could free up billions of hours per year – resulting in incredible value creation.
Normally, we would give a lot of slack to someone trying to solve this difficult issue, but Tesla has shortened its own slack by selling its “Full Self-Driving” package to customers since 2016 and promising to achieve self-driving every year since 2019.
Despite yearly guidance that it is about to achieve full self-driving, Tesla has had some arguably good excuses for not being able to achieve its goal.
For example, neural nets didn’t power vehicle controls. Early Tesla comments about drivers “teaching” its self-driving system pointed toward this always being the case, but Tesla didn’t introduce neural net-based vehicle controls until FSD beta v12, which is being rolled out right now.
Another excuse has been compute power limitations creating a bottleneck in its neural net training.
Tesla’s Dojo supercomputer program was meant to fix that, but the automaker has seen significant delays in that program.
To compensate, Tesla has been investing billions of dollars in Nvidia computing power to create new supercomputer clusters to train its neural nets.
Now, CEO Elon Musk says that Tesl is “no longer AI training compute constrained”:
While Musk didn’t elaborate on the situation, it sounds like Tesla brought more compute power online recently because the CEO was complaining about compute power being a bottleneck just a few months ago.
Electrek’s Take
This is the combination, training compute and end-to-end neural nets, that FSD fans have been hailing as the last piece of the puzzle for a while now.
In theory, it makes sense to me. If Tesla’s approach is the right one, now that everything is powered with neural nets and now that it has the computing power to train the neural nets, we should see a massive increase in the rate of improvement.
But we need to see that happen now because there are no more excuses after this.
Tesla needs to start releasing clear data that shows a path to FSD becoming a true unsupervised self-driving system as promised. Otherwise, it’s going to have to admit that it can’t achieve level 4 or 5 autonomy.
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Solar panel giant Qcells announced today that it’s temporarily furloughing 1,000 US workers – 25% of its workforce – and reducing pay and shifts at its factories in northeast Georgia due to supply chain delays caused by US Customs.
Qcells furloughs 1,000 workers
The supply chain delays are hindering the company’s ability to import components to build its solar panels. This has resulted in Qcells’ two factories in Cartersville and Dalton being unable to operate at full capacity for several months.
Qcells spokeswoman Marta Stoepker shared the following statement in an exclusive with Channel 2 Action News in Atlanta:
The company says the furloughed workers, who were notified this afternoon, will retain full benefits and won’t be laid off. However, Qcells will no longer be using staffing agency employees in Georgia “at this time.”
As Qcells introduced new supply chains to support its growing solar panel manufacturing facilities in Georgia, the company was recently forced to scale back production while our shipments into the US were delayed in the customs clearance process.
Although our supply chain operations are beginning to normalize, today we shared with our employees that HR actions must be taken to improve operational efficiency until production capacity returns to normal levels.
Stoepker said it expects to bring the furloughed workers back “in the coming weeks and months.” She continued:
Our commitment to building the entire solar supply chain in the United States remains. We will soon be back on track with the full force of our Georgia team delivering American-made energy to communities around the country.
Electrek’s Take
In January 2023, the Seoul-headquartered Qcells announced it would invest more than $2.5 billion to build a solar supply chain in Georgia – the largest-ever investment in clean energy manufacturing in the US to date. That included expanding the Dalton solar factory and building a fully integrated solar supply chain factory in Cartersville, Georgia, that will manufacture solar ingots, wafers, cells, and finished panels.
It’s not quite there yet, because that takes time. In the meantime, it’s being penalized by Customs. The US government under Trump says it’s keen on boosting domestic manufacturing. Why would it work against a company that’s onshoring an entire solar supply chain, including recycling?
Dalton and Cartersville employ nearly 4,000 people. Its total output will reach 8.4 GW of solar production capacity per year, which is equivalent to nearly 46,000 panels per day – enough to power approximately 1.3 million homes annually.
It’s ludicrous that it has been forced to furlough a quarter of its workforce due to the ineptness of the Trump administration’s US Customs policies. This is right up there with the ICE arrests at Hyundai’s plant in Georgia. Bravo.
Read more: Georgia gives US solar panel manufacturing a big boost with a new factory
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The breakthrough EV batteries Toyota says will double driving range and cut charging times are facing another setback. The company is once again delaying plans for a new battery plant in Japan.
Why is Toyota delaying its EV battery plant this time?
Earlier this year, Toyota bought a 280,000-square-meter plot of land in Fukuoka, Japan, where it planned to build a plant to produce the more advanced EV batteries.
A location agreement was expected to be signed by April, but Toyota pushed back construction by several months, blaming slower-than-expected demand for electric vehicles.
The agreement was expected to be finalized this Fall, but that will no longer be the case. According to Nikkei, Toyota is delaying the EV battery plant for the second time. Toyota will review and adjust plans over the next year.
Fukuoka governor, Seitaro Hattori, confirmed the news with reporters on Friday following a meeting with Toyota’s president, Koji Sato. Hattori also shut down claims that Toyota was planning to scrap the battery plant altogether.
Toyota again blamed slowing EV demand for the delay. The decision comes despite Keiji Kaita, president of Toyota’s Carbon Neutral Advanced Engineering Development Center, confirming at the Japan Mobility Show just last week that it’s “sticking on the schedule” to introduce its first solid-state battery-powered EV by 2028.
Last month, Toyota said it aimed to “achieve the world’s first practical use of all-solid-state batteries in BEVs” after securing a partnership with Sumitomo Metal Mining Co. to mass-produce them. It’s also working with Japanese oil giant Idemitsu.
The company recently revealed a solid-state battery pack prototype that it claims can deliver 747 miles (1,200 km) range and 10-minute fast charging, but will we ever see it actually in production?
Electrek’s Take
Toyota has been making empty promises about EV batteries for almost a decade now. It initially planned to introduce solid-state EV batteries in 2020, then pushed it to 2023, then 2026, and now it’s saying it will be around 2028.
Mass production is likely closer to the end of the decade, if Toyota doesn’t delay it again. While it’s blaming the slowing demand, global EV sales are still on the rise. According to Rho Motion, global EV sales topped 2 million for the first time in a single month in September 2025. Through the first nine months of the year, EV sales are up 26% compared to the same period in 2024.
Even with the US ending the $7,500 federal tax credit and other policies designed to promote electric vehicles, global adoption will continue building momentum over the next few years.
Is it a demand issue, or is Toyota just looking for another excuse? With rivals like Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz, Hyundai, BMW, and Honda advancing next-gen EV batteries, Toyota will only fall further behind if it continues delaying key projects.
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