The story of Optimus, the humanoid robot at the heart of Elon Musk’s growth plans for Tesla | Business Insider

Tesla CEO Elon Musk first introduced an Optimus prototype in 2022.

PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP—Getty Images/Reuters

• Tesla is developing a humanoid robot called Optimus.
• CEO Elon Musk said about 80% of Tesla’s future value could come from Optimus.
• Musk teased Optimus V3 on X, calling it “sublime.”

For Elon Musk, the future of Tesla isn’t its global fleet of electric vehicles.

It’s Optimus, the humanoid robot the company is developing to assist humans with everyday tasks.

“~80% of Tesla’s value will be Optimus,” Musk wrote on X this month.

Although Musk is involved in several business ventures — including aerospace manufacturing and AI development — creating an autonomous humanoid robot has long been a priority. In 2024, Musk told shareholders that Optimus could help Tesla raise its market cap to $25 trillion in the future.

“Even the most optimistic estimates that I’ve seen for Optimus — the Optimus optimist — I think underaccount the magnitude of what the robot will be able to do,” Musk said.

If Musk’s predictions hold true, Optimus will help ensure that he meets the various thresholds on his $1 trillion pay package proposed by Tesla’s board this month.

Here’s everything you need to know about Optimus.

Elon Musk introduced the Tesla Bot in 2021.

CFOTO/Future Publishing via Getty Images

Although Tesla became a household name as an automaker, the company announced during an AI event in 2021 that it would expand into humanoid robots.

Musk said what was then called the Tesla Bot would be 5’8″ and weigh 125 pounds. The robot would be able to deadlift 150 pounds and carry 45 pounds, but only travel around 5 mph.

Musk said the robot, built with eight cameras and the company’s Autopilot software, would make working optional

“Essentially, in the future, physical work will be a choice,” Musk said. “If you want to do it, you can, but you won’t need to do it.”

However, audience members didn’t see an official prototype that day. Instead, a man wearing a robot-themed bodysuit danced and paraded across the stage.

An official prototype, dubbed Optimus, debuted in 2022.

By January 2022, Musk had developed lofty ambitions for Tesla’s humanoid robot, which became known as Optimus.

“In terms of priority of products, I think the most important product development we’re doing this year is actually the Optimus humanoid,” he said during Tesla’s Q4 earnings call.

Musk unveiled an official Optimus prototype eight months later during Tesla AI Day. At the event, audience members watched as the robot walked across the stage, moved its limbs, and waved at the crowd.

Tesla accompanied the demonstration with a video of Optimus completing various tasks, including delivering a package and watering plants. “There’s still a lot of work to be done to refine Optimus and improve it,” Musk said. “Obviously, this is just Optimus version one. “

In 2023, Tesla debuted Optimus Gen 2.

CFOTO/CFOTO/Future Publishing via Getty Images

Tesla showed off Optimus Gen 2 in late 2023.

In a December promotional video, the company said a 30% walk speed boost and improved full-body control were among the updates for Optimus Gen 2. Footage also showed the robot doing squats and picking up an egg.

The robots’ improved capabilities highlight how quickly the larger humanoid robotics landscape is transforming.

“Everything in this video is real, no CGI,” Tesla senior manager Julian Ibarz wrote on X. All real time, nothing sped up. Incredible hardware improvements from the team.”

Optimus robots took center stage at Tesla’s 2024 “We Robot” event.

Optimus is your personal R2D2 / C3PO, but better

It will also transform physical labor in industrial settings pic.twitter.com/iCET3a9pd8

— Tesla (@Tesla) October 11, 2024

Although Tesla unveiled its Robotaxi and Robovan during its 2024 “We, Robot” event, the Optimus robots stole the show.

During the event, robots served drinks, answered questions, and played rock-paper-scissors. Videos of guests interacting with the robots gained traction on social media.

“One of the things we wanted to show tonight is that Optimus is not a canned video, it’s not walled off,” Musk told guests. “The Optimus robots will walk among you. Please be nice to the Optimus robots.”

However, the robots aren’t fully autonomous just yet. Analysts at Morgan Stanley said the Optimus robots at the event “relied on tele-ops,” meaning a human controlled the robot remotely. The event failed to impress Wall Street analysts and investors, resulting in Musk’s net worth falling $15 billion that October.

Musk says he plans to scale up humanoid robots by the end of 2025.

“Unfortunately, what choice do we have? Apple didn’t just put their thumb on the scale, they put their whole body!” Elon Musk wrote on X on Monday.Chip Somodevilla via Getty Images

In May, Musk told CNBC he planned to place Optimus robots in Tesla factories by the end of 2025.

“We expect to have thousands of Optimus robots working in Tesla factories by the end of this year, beginning this fall,” Musk said. “And we expect to scale Optimus up faster than any product, I think, in history, to get to millions of units per year as soon as possible.”

He said Tesla could produce one million units by 2030.

“I think we feel confident in getting to one million units per year in less than five years, maybe four years. So by 2030, I feel confident in predicting one million Optimus units per year — it might be 2029,” he said.

Tesla’s Q1 2025 update said the company is “on track” for its Optimus builds on its Fremont pilot production line.

However, Chris Walti, the former team lead for Tesla’s robot, told Business Insider that humanoid robots may not be an ideal fit in factories.

“It’s not a useful form factor. Most of the work that has to be done in industry is highly repetitive tasks where velocity is key,” Walti said.

Optimus has weathered production challenges amid new tariffs.

Tesla’s Optimus robot on display inside the Tesla pop-up store near Shibuya crossing in April 2025.Stanislav Kogiku/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

During Tesla’s earnings call in April, Musk said Optimus production was affected by supply chain issues in China. Tesla uses rare-earth magnets from China to power the robot’s actuators.

China requires an export license for certain rare-earth materials, which pushed Tesla to look for alternative sources. Beijing paused exports of specific rare-earth elements in response to President Donald Trump’s tariffs.

Additionally, Musk said China needed reassurance that the magnets Tesla acquires wouldn’t be used for a weaponized system or in other robots.

“Tesla as a whole does not need to use permanent magnets, but when something is volume constrained, like an arm of the robot, then you want to try to make the motors as small as possible,” Musk said.

At the time, Musk said Tesla was “working through” the issue with China and hoped to get a license.

Tesla changed how it trains Optimus robots.

A Tesla Optimus robot at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in China in July 2025.Feature China/Future Publishing via Getty Images

Tesla has changed its strategy for training the Optimus robot.

The company will now primarily use video recordings of humans performing tasks to train the robots instead of motion capture suits and teleoperation.

The company believes stepping back from teleoperation and motion capture suits will allow Tesla to scale data collection faster, insiders told Business Insider last month.

The pivot underscores Musk’s belief that AI can complete complex tasks using cameras. He’s used a similar approach when training Tesla’s autonomous driving software.

Elon Musk teased Optimus V3 in September.

That’s Optimus 2.5. Optimus 3 will have agility roughly equal to an agile human.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 14, 2025

Musk has hyped up the newest model of Optimus multiple times on X, including in July when he said, “Optimus 3 will have agility roughly equal to an agile human.”

More recently, Musk called Optimus V3 “sublime” in an X post on Sunday.

Read the original article on Business Insider

Source: The story of Optimus, the humanoid robot at the heart of Elon Musk’s growth plans for Tesla

An Internal Revolution Started By The Communists | End Of The American Dream

Everyone knew that there would be violence once Donald Trump returned to the White House.  He has been the most demonized man in America for the past eight years, and there are a lot of people out there that have deeply internalized the propaganda that has been relentlessly pounded into their heads.  At this point, there is no president in the entire history of our country that the left hates more than Donald Trump.  Just the mere thought of him can provoke uncontrollable rage in many leftists.  So it was inevitable that there would be violence, and I am entirely convinced that what we have experienced so far is just the beginning of a tsunami of civil disorder.

During the past couple of months, Tesla vehicles and Tesla dealerships have become favorite targets for those that absolutely hate the changes that Donald Trump and Elon Musk have been making to the federal government.  The following summary of attacks was put together by Connor O’Keeffe…

In recent weeks, there has been a sharp increase in violent attacks aimed at destroying cars and other property carrying the logo of Elon Musk’s electric car company, Tesla.

In Colorado, a woman was charged with using Molotov cocktails to set multiple cars at a Tesla dealership on fire before painting the word Nazi on a store sign. In Oregon, one man fired a rifle into one Tesla dealership while someone else fired shots and threw explosives into another. In Washington, four Tesla Cybertrucks were set on fire, a Tesla sedan was covered in gasoline and set ablaze on a city street, and various other Cybertrucks had swastikas painted on them.

Seven Tesla charging stations were burned in Massachusetts, two Teslas were set on fire in Texas, several Teslas were shot and lit on fire in Nevada, and much more. As recently as Monday, multiple firebombs were discovered in a Tesla dealership in Austin, Texas. It’s clear that these are, at the very least, copycat acts aimed at Elon Musk and anyone who owns or is interested in buying a car from his company.

We have seen attacks happen over and over again, and a number of the perpetrators have been arrested.

Needless to say, it isn’t moderate Democrats that are committing these acts of violence.

In almost every case, the ideology of those that have been arrested is on the far left of the political spectrum.

In fact, a 36-year-old man that has been charged with a series of attacks in Las Vegas is being described as a “potential communist”…

An alleged ‘Communist’ has been arrested in Las Vegas for setting several Tesla cars on fire using Molotov cocktails before firing rounds into the burning vehicles on March 18.

Paul Hyon Kim, 36, was charged on Wednesday with 15 offenses, including arson and destroying or injuring personal property valued at $5,000 or more, police told a press conference the following day.

Las Vegas Metro Police also said Kim’s social media indicated that he was a ‘potential Communist’ with ‘pro Palestine affiliations’, according to Fox News reporter Bill Melugin.

Even before the election, many on the far left were openly talking about the need for a “revolution” if Trump won.

Now that Trump is back in the Oval Office, the chatter about a “revolution” on social media has only intensified.

Most conservatives have no idea how serious there people are about their plans.

Of course many on the far left don’t use the term “communist” anymore.  Instead they will refer to themselves as “socialists”, “anarchists”, “revolutionaries” or “progressives”.

But at the end of the day, their ideology is pretty much indistinguishable from the ideology of other communist movements all over the globe.

Many conservatives are downplaying the threat of far left violence, and I believe that is a huge mistake.

Yes, there have been some incidents that have been quite funny.  For example, one radical leftist that attempted to ram his four-wheeler into the side of a Cybertruck should have known that it wouldn’t do any damage at all.  The following comes from a humorous piece that was posted on Zero Hedge…

We present readers with what may be one of the dumbest, most brainwashed, unhealthiest, lowest IQ, and unhinged Democrat yet—a morbidly obsessed activist who slammed his ATV into the driver’s side of a Tesla Cybertruck, an incident likely linked to radical far-left political grievances captured by the vehicle’s Sentry Mode security cameras.

Tesla investor Sawyer Merritt wrote on X, “This guy was arrested today after ramming his mini four-wheeler into a Cybertruck,” adding, “Little did he know that the Cybertruck has 1.8mm bulletproof stainless-steel doors capable of taking some heavy hits. He was charged with one count of felony criminal mischief & failure to identify.”

Apparently this particular individual vandalized a number of Tesla vehicles, and Texarkana police reported on Facebook that they now have him in custody…

We arrested 33 year old Demarqeyun Cox this afternoon after he allegedly damaged multiple Tesla vehicles in separate incidents across the city today.

The first report came from the Golden Palace restaurant on Summerhill Road, where surveillance footage from the car itself captured a guy on a mini four-wheeler intentionally ramming a parked Tesla at full speed. While officers were searching for the suspect, another call came in reporting damage to a Tesla in the Lowe’s parking lot.

Shortly after that, Officer Blake Lummus spotted Cox riding a mini four-wheeler near Summerhill and New Boston Roads and recognized him as the suspect in the earlier video. After being stopped, Cox initially gave a false name but was quickly identified and taken into custody.

That is great news.

But there are thousands of others just like him.

And in this environment, Elon Musk is not the only billionaire that is being targeted.

A “Robin Hood mentality” is starting to take hold in America, and there are apparently many leftists that are convinced that it is okay to shoplift from Whole Foods because it is owned by Jeff Bezos…

Take Jesse, a 30-something tech worker who until recently would steal entire bags of groceries from Whole Foods with his roommates. A friend at Instacart tipped them off to the opportunity — with so many personal shoppers roaming around the aisles, workers weren’t going to notice another person loading bags or whether they were paying for what was in them. Once, they got expensive steaks from the butcher and left without paying for them, later grilling them out on a friend’s roof.

“I never felt bad for the corporation as a whole, because it was Amazon and, you know, it was Jeff Bezos,” Jesse said. “He just profits so much taking advantage of the little people, so if we as little people can bite back a little bit, and that’s me taking $100 maybe out of revenue for him, that’s a little bit of a middle finger.”

Separately, there’s Carson, another Whole Foods bandit whose friends joke they’re actually “liberating” items from the store, not stealing. As Carson, a 30-something who works in the nonprofit sector, told me for a story last year, he likes slipping salmon lox into his laptop sleeve and estimates he saves about $1,000 in groceries a year by shoplifting, largely from Whole Foods.

Stealing something that does not belong to you is always wrong.

It doesn’t matter if it is owned by a billionaire or by a homeless person.

Unfortunately, so many leftists in our society now believe that morality is relative.

They have created an entirely alternate reality for themselves where it is okay to lie, cheat, steal and firebomb Tesla dealerships.

And in this alternate reality, Donald Trump is literally the devil.

Since Trump is literally the personification of evil in their minds, they desperately want Democrats in Washington “to be much more aggressive” with Trump…

Mike Arnold, a 74-year-old Air Force veteran from Cathedral City, California, said he attended a Khanna event in Norco this past weekend, because he “got tired of screaming at the TV.”

Like Siegel, he said he isn’t sure the country will make it to Democratic elections in 2026. Trump, he said, is advancing an authoritarian agenda — bullying white-shoe law firms and universities and calling for the impeachment of judges who rule against him.

“The courts might not hold, and if the courts don’t hold, the only next thing is the military itself,” said Arnold. Democratic leaders, Arnold said, “have to be much more aggressive than they have been.”

During the weeks and months ahead, I certainly expect the left to get “much more aggressive”, and that will not be good for any of us.

In a civilized society, there is no room for political violence.

Unfortunately, we are not a civilized society any longer.

An internal revolution has already begun, and it will grow every time Donald Trump makes another major move that the left does not like.

Sadly, most people on the left and the right have no idea where all of this civil disorder will eventually take us.

Michael’s new book entitled “Why” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “Why” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com. He has also written eight other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

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Elon Musk: A Bigger Fan Of Thomas Edison Than Nikola Tesla

03-27-2025 • https://insideevs.com, By: Steven Loveday

On the face of it, the similarities between Elon Musk and Thomas Edison are not hard to see: Each is an American engineer turned entrepreneur with a long list of inventions, electrical and otherwise, to his credit. Both men have captured the popular imagination, and are deservedly revered for their contributions to society. Looking a little deeper, we find some uncanny parallels between the lives of these two, as Peter Mears writes in a recent installment of the Biz Vinci* blog.

Musk and Edison had different backgrounds – the former was born in South Africa, and the latter was born in Ohio and grew up in Michigan. However, both seem to have had difficult childhoods. Edison was a sickly child, and had lifelong hearing problems stemming from an early bout of scarlet fever (a cruel irony for a man who would later make great advancements in sound recording). Mears tells us that Musk was severely bullied as a child. Musk told biographer Ashlee Vance that his father had a domineering streak, and discouraged the young man’s interest in computers.

Both entrepreneurs got started making money very early in life, and each had a great capacity for self-learning. When Elon was about 12, he created a computer game called Blastar, sold it to a computer magazine for around $500, and invested the money in a pharmaceutical stock, which he later sold for a healthy profit. Edison, who was home-schooled by his mother, sold newspapers as a child and later published his own paper, called the Grand Trunk Herald. He went on to found the corporate giant General Electric, and no less than 14 other companies. He eventually amassed a fortune of over $12 million, equivalent to billions in today’s dollars.

After Musk found his way to the entrepreneur-friendly US, “where great things are possible,” he created Zip2, an online city guide that he sold to major newspapers, a forerunner of indispensable modern resources like Google Maps and Yelp. His next act was to revolutionize online payments with PayPal. He sold his share to eBay in 2002, and took home around $180 million from the deal. His next move could have been “retiring and buying an island somewhere and sipping mai-tais, but that was not of interest to me at all.” Instead, he went on to found (or help establish) Tesla, SpaceX and SolarCity, with the unabashed goal of changing the world for the good of mankind. Today his net worth is estimated at over $11 billion.

Read Full Story

Zelensky is ‘all-time champion’ of US-aid heist – Musk | RT – Daily news

Comments from Tesla and SpaceX CEO follow the announcement of a $2.5 billion arms package by President Joe Biden

SpaceX and Tesla founder Elon Musk speaks during an America PAC town hall on October 26, 2024. © Samuel Corum/Getty Images

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has referred to Vladimir Zelensky as an “all-time champ” in a post on social platform X following US President Joe Biden’s announcement on Monday of a $2.5 billion US arms package for Kiev.

Musk’s remark came in response to another X user’s comment saying that the Ukrainian leader “has genuinely pulled off one of the greatest money heists of all time.”

President Biden’s latest military aid package for Ukraine includes advanced weaponry, ammunition, and armored vehicles, with a total value of $2.5 billion. Biden emphasized the need to support Ukraine in his final weeks in office, specifying that $1.25 billion of the package would be drawn from US stockpiles under the Presidential Drawdown Authority (PDA).

Utah Senator Mike Lee referred to the package as “money laundering,” in another X post on Sunday. There have been bipartisan calls for audits that have questioned the transparency and accountability of the $175 billion in US assistance since the Ukraine conflict began.

Read more

White House makes 21 day pledge to Ukraine

The Tesla and SpaceX CEO has repeatedly questioned the allocation and oversight of Western resources sent to Kiev. In March, Musk stated that Kiev should give Washington “proper accounting of how it is used and a plan to resolve the conflict.” He has also accused top US officials – most notably former Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland, known for her leading role in the 2014 Maidan coup in Kiev – of “pushing this war.”

While SpaceX has provided the Ukrainian military with Starlink internet terminals, Musk has long argued that Kiev cannot hope to defeat Russian forces on the battlefield and that the conflict must end in a negotiated settlement. During the summer, Musk endorsed White House aspirant Donald Trump, who has vowed to bring a swift end to the fighting.

After winning the presidential election Trump pitched Musk and fellow billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy to co-head the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a body that will be tasked with reducing government waste and streamlining the federal bureaucracy.

READ MORE: Musk and Trump Jr. laugh at Zelensky ‘Home Alone’ meme

The billionaire has also reportedly engaged in direct communications with Zelensky in a phone call between the Ukrainian leader and Trump in November.

According to Axios’ sources, Musk promised to continue supporting Ukraine through his Starlink satellites.

Last month, Musk mocked Zelensky’s “amazing” sense of humor after the Ukrainian leader claimed in a radio interview that his country is “independent” and cannot be forced to the negotiating table by the US.

Source: Zelensky is ‘all-time champion’ of US-aid heist – Musk