Elon Musk\'s Tesla Robotaxi bet deemed boring as NIO touts using autonomous driving tech to make roads safer

One of the most innovative electric car companies that already offers semi solid-state batteries and a swap station network has no intentions to make an autonomous robotaxi, or start a ride-share service like Tesla.

NIO's founder William Li is of the opinion that the business model that Elon Musk is betting Tesla's mass market EV future on is neither sustainable nor particularly inspiring.

The "robotaxi will never be a business that becomes borderless like software or cloud services," Li thinks, as there is a finite number of ride-share cabs that cities could accommodate, and most are already occupied by other services already.

"Why would I want to take business from ride hailing drivers, I don't think it's inspiring," he said, and added that NIO will instead focus on making the roads safer with its driver-assist technology.

Elon Musk's idea is to create a Cybercab ride-share platform of sorts, where both standalone robotaxis and other Tesla cars will contribute to the fleet.

His current projections are for the first autonomous robotaxi ride to take place some time in 2025, pending regulatory approval.

Tesla, however, just postponed the announcement of the standalone robotaxi to October 10, in order to make some front design changes. It also teased that a "more affordable vehicle," perhaps the elusive Model 2, will be arriving next year.

NIO will have a direct competitor to the Model 2 under the upcoming Firefly brand that will sell its cheaper EVs globally. It, however, remains skeptical about the business potential of Elon Musk's robotaxi obsession, at least for now.

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