Meet Your New Colleague: The Tesla Bot

If cheap labour is available anywhere within any country, what advantages remain for countries that were banking on this commodity for their economic growth? This will be the question on the minds of the leaders of such nations, given that we are now approaching the not-too-distant launch of bipedal robots aimed at providing an alternative to human labour, not only in factories but also in a domestic capacity.

In 2021, Elon Musk announced the Tesla Bot (TB) with the specific aim of replicating his success in convincing us to purchase something we didn’t know we wanted. The TB is a humanoid robot standing around 173cm tall (5 feet 8 inches) and weighing about 57kg (125 pounds). The robot is designed to accomplish tasks that a human could do, so it comes equipped with human-like hands with fine motor skills to ensure it doesn’t crush your beer as it hands one to you. Furthermore, if you managed to get one mad, don’t worry, as it can't really catch you given that it moves at a max speed of 5mph. So we won’t have to worry about an iRobot-style attack with the first generation, at least. Maybe there will be a Performance model that could give you a bit of a chase.

You might think, "So what? It’s just another expensive plaything of the rich, and I don’t need one in my life." Well, you might also want to consider that, just as Tesla predicts that owners of their vehicles can earn money by letting their car do some taxi work while it would otherwise be left parked, the TB might be able to get some work done for you somewhere. Imagine that! Yes, this is far-fetched, but the applications we can envisage now will certainly not be the limitation of the product in the future.

Tesla aims to sell these for use in manufacturing tasks, especially in roles that require heavy lifting or high-danger environments currently covered by those humans willing to endure the nature of such work in exchange for suitable compensation. However, if these jobs could be done by robots with no break time and no danger pay, the long-term economics are clearly attractive, and it removes the risks of loss of life to boot! As mentioned, the TB will be available for you and me to purchase if we feel the need to have a silent and mostly motionless friend at home (reminds me of my roommate at university, minus the smell). Being serious for a moment, this may sound silly, but imagine further down the line when the product is in a later generation and capable of taking care of your grandparents or pets while you’re away. Now that does have some value if the technology is refined to an acceptable level.

Tesla demonstrated the first working prototype in September 2022, showing its basic skills and functionality. However, as with all things Elon Musk, this will continue to improve over the coming years, and I have no reason to believe they won’t make this a very compelling product. The timeline for mass production, while still unknown, is thought to be within the next few years, while they overcome some technical challenges, not to mention perfecting how to integrate AI into the device safely and effectively.

Ultimately, the product represents something of a dual-purpose machine with applications only limited to the ideas that Tesla can come up with. Perhaps the larger and more serious implication is that we are now about to enter the historic moment where humans can be replaced even in manual labour roles at scale if needed. For countries such as China, Vietnam, and India, this represents a potential competitive threat, given that their economic model strongly leverages vast human capital to attract industrialists looking to set up shop and save on labour costs versus doing so closer to home in the West. In a world where any country can offer labour, limited only by the cost of electricity and an initial investment, how do such countries continue to exploit their former natural resource?

The world is moving away from globalisation as we knew it, with reshoring and near-shoring being the buzzwords of the current time. It looks like a product such as the Tesla Bot could be a bigger success than the electric car has been for the company.

The potential to have factories running 24/7 with no breaks, no unions, and no unnecessary supporting facilities to pay for is clearly an attractive prospect for any investing organisation.

While this may seem somewhat doom and gloom, it may not have to be. In a world where humans no longer do the hard work or have to juggle the stresses of life dominated by it, perhaps the general mood of mankind might improve for the better.

We can talk about how the opposite might look in another article!