Tesla must provide NHTSA with Autopilot recall data by July or face up to $135 million in fines
Tesla vehicles sit on the lot at a Tesla dealership in Austin, Texas, on April 15, 2024.
Brandon Bell | Getty Images
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is pressing Tesla for answers about changes the company made to its Autopilot driver assistance system following a voluntary software recall in December that affected about 2 million vehicles in the U.S.
Tesla must meet a deadline of July 1 to provide information to the regulator or face fines up to $135.8 million, according to a letter sent by the NHTSA to company on May 6.
The recall was intended to improve Tesla’s driver-engagement systems, which are used to monitor whether drivers are safely using features like traffic aware cruise control, lane keeping and auto steering — part of Autopilot. Since the recall, at least 20 Tesla vehicles have been involved in crashes in which the system was thought to be in use, according to a filing on the NHTSA’s website.
The “recall remedy” probe follows a three-year investigation by the agency that found safety issues with Tesla Autopilot contributed to at least 467 collisions and 14 deaths from January 2018 through August 2023.
The NHTSA had concluded that drivers involved in those crashes “were not sufficiently engaged in the driving task and that the warnings provided by Autopilot when Autosteer was engaged did not adequately ensure that drivers maintained their attention on the driving task.”
Driver-engagement systems, sometimes known as driver-monitoring systems, in Tesla vehicles include torque sensors in the steering wheel to detect whether drivers are keeping their hands on the wheel, and in-cabin cameras that monitor a driver’s gaze. They should alert any inattentive driver to pay attention and stay ready to steer or brake at any time.
The NHTSA is seeking detailed crash data from the electric vehicle maker since the agency issued the recall update on Autopilot, including data and video stored in or streamed from its cars and retained by the company.
They’re also asking for records about Tesla’s engineering teams and their approach to “safety defect determination decision making,” “issue investigation,” “action design including human factors considerations (initial and modifications),” and “testing.”
Tesla is in the middle of a massive reorganization and sweeping layoffs. The company hasn’t disclosed how many jobs in its Autopilot and vehicle-safety engineering teams may have been cut.
For about a decade, CEO Elon Musk has been promising that Tesla is on the cusp of a self-driving breakthrough. With sales of Tesla EVs dropping in the first quarter, Musk has been focusing investors’ attention on his dream of a future full of Tesla artificial intelligence products, including robotaxis and “sentient” humanoid robots that can do factory work.
Tesla shares fell 3.8% on Tuesday to $177.81 and are down 28% year to date.
Masayoshi Son, chairman and chief executive officer of SoftBank Group Corp., speaks during the company’s annual general meeting in Tokyo, Japan, on Friday, June 27, 2025.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Intel and SoftBank announced on Monday that the Japanese conglomerate will make a $2 billion investment in the embattled chipmaker.
SoftBank will pay $23 per share for Intel’s common stock, which closed on Monday at $23.66. The shares rose about 6% in extended trading to $25.
The investment makes SoftBank the fifth-biggest Intel shareholder, according to FactSet. It’s a vote of support for Intel, which hasn’t been able to take advantage of the artificial intelligence boom in advanced semiconductors and has spent heavily to stand up a manufacturing business that’s yet to secure a significant customer.
“Masa and I have worked closely together for decades, and I appreciate the confidence he has placed in Intel with this investment,” Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan said in a statement, referring to SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son.
Intel shares lost 60% of their value last year, their worst performance in the company’s more than half-century on the public market. The stock is up 18% in 2025 as of Monday’s close.
Tan took over as Intel CEO in March after his predecessor, Pat Gelsinger, was ousted in December.
Intel has been a major topic of discussion in Washington of late, due to the company’s role as the only American company capable of manufacturing the most advanced chips.
However, Intel’s foundry business, which is designed to manufacture chips for other companies, has yet to secure a major customer, a critical step towards stabilization and expansion. Last month, Intel said it would wait to secure orders before committing to certain future investment in its foundry.
Tan met with President Donald Trump last week after the president had called for the CEO’s resignation. The U.S. government is considering taking an equity stake in Intel, according to reports.
SoftBank, meanwhile, has become an increasingly large player in the global chip and AI markets.
In 2016, SoftBank acquired chip designer Arm in a deal worth about $32 billion at the time. Today the company is worth almost $150 billion. Arm-based chips are part of Nvidia’s systems that go into data centers.
And in March of this year, SoftBank announced plans to acquire another chip designer, Ampere Computing, for $6.5 billion.
SoftBank was also part of President Trump’s Stargate announcement in January, along with OpenAI and Oracle.
The three companies committed to invest an initial $100 billion and up to $500 billion over the next four years in the AI infrastructure project. Two months later, SoftBank led a $40 billion investment into OpenAI, the largest private tech deal on record.
“This strategic investment reflects our belief that advanced semiconductor manufacturing and supply will further expand in the United States, with Intel playing a critical role,” Son said in a statement.
Nikesh Arora, CEO of Palo Alto Networks, looks on during the closing bell at the Nasdaq Market in New York City on March 25, 2025.
Jeenah Moon | Reuters
Palo Alto Networks reported better-than-expected quarterly results and issued upbeat guidance for the current period. The cybersecurity software vendor said Nir Zuk, who founded the company in 2005, is retiring from his role as chief technology officer.
The stock rose about 6% in extended trading.
Here’s how the company did compared to LSEG estimates:
- Earnings: 95 cents adjusted vs. 88 cents expected
- Revenue: $2.54 billion vs. $2.5 billion expected.
Revenue in the fiscal fourth quarter rose 16% from about $2.2 billion last year, the company said in a statement. Net income fell to about $254 million, or 36 cents per share, from about $358 million, or 51 cents per share, in the year-ago period.
The company also issued upbeat guidance for the fiscal first quarter. Earnings per share will be between 88 cents and 90 cents, Palo Alto said, topping an 85-cents estimate from StreetAccount.
For the full year, Palo Alto said revenue will range from $10.48 billion to $10.53 billion on adjusted earnings of $3.75 to $3.85 per share. Both estimates exceeded Wall Street’s projections.
Palo Alto said that for the fiscal first quarter, remaining purchase obligations, which tracks backlog, will range between $15.4 billion and $15.5 billion, surpassing a $15.07 billion estimate.
Last month, the company announced plans to buy Israeli identity security provider CyberArk for $25 billion. It’s the largest deal Palo Alto has made since its founding, and most ambitious in an acquiring spree that ramped up after CEO Nikesh Arora took the helm of the company in 2018.
Shares sold off sharply after the news broke and have yet to recover previous highs. The stock is down about 3% this year as of Monday’s close.
“We look for great products, a team that can execute in the product, and we let them run it,” Arora told CNBC following the announcement. “This is going to be a different challenge, but we’ve done well 24 times, so I’m pretty confident that our team can handle this.”
Lee Klarich, the company’s product chief, will replace Zuk as CTO and fill his position on the board.
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