Optimus
(Picture: AFP via Getty Images)Tesla boss Elon Musk finally unveiled a highly-awaited prototype of its humanoid robot “Optimus”.
The tech billionaire showcased Optimus – named after the protagonist in Hollywood franchise Transformers – at the electric vehicle maker’s “AI Day” event on Friday.
The robot walked on stage and waved to a cheering crowd. A video of the robot carrying a box, watering plants and moving metal bars in the automaker’s factory was also shown.
“Our goal is to make a useful humanoid robot as quickly as possible,” Mr Musk said at the event at a Tesla office in Palo Alto, California.
“There’s still a lot of work to be done to refine Optimus and prove it.”
Mr Musk said currently humanoid robots were “missing a brain”, saying they don’t have the intelligence to navigate the world by themselves, and they were also very expensive and made in low volume.
He later told the audience that the robot is capable of doing a lot more but “we just didn’t want it to fall on its face”.
People can probably buy an Optimus “within three to five years,” Mr Musk said.
Tesla said Optimus robots would have four fingers and a thumb with a tendon-like system so they could have the dexterity of humans.
The robot is backed by giant artificial intelligence computers that track millions of video frames from “Full Self-Driving” autos.
Similar computers would be used to teach tasks to the robots, they said.
