[imagesource:tesla]

Elon Musk might not be progressing in the Twitter-sphere – sorry, X – but things are looking to be on track over at Tesla.

Even though the billionaire is supposedly quite alarmed by runaway artificial intelligence, having spoken about his fears repeatedly already, he has been making his electric car company work on humanoid robots.

This dude is weird and his Tesla Bot is not so far behind.

Tesla just unveiled the ‘Optimus Gen 2’, the new generation of its humanoid robot that should be able to take over repetitive tasks from humans, noted Electrek.

When the Tesla Bot or Optimus was first introduced, many laughed it off as it looked like a dancer disguised as a robot for visual aid. The prototypes, unveiled earlier this year, were slightly more impressive than the initial bot, suggesting that this sideshow could potentially become a real product soon enough.

Electrek notes that while people can see the value in a human-like robot (the Tesla CEO has angled it into something that can fix the labour crisis), the problem is that people can’t really see Tesla making it a reality, especially since the latest demo at Tesla AI Day last year wasn’t that amazing.

The very early prototype didn’t look like much, and just waved at the crowd while barely walking around:

Then, Musk gave an update on the Tesla Bot at the 2023 shareholders meeting, which included way more impressive, albeit stiff as heck, prospects.

Tesla has been sticking to it, arguing that its vehicles are already robots on wheels, it just needs to make them in humanoid forms to be able to replace humans in some tasks.

In September, there was another Optimus update, which said that the Bot is now being trained with neural nets end-to-end, and it was able to perform new tasks, like sorting objects autonomously.

Today, the automaker unveiled the Optimus Gen 2, a new generation of the humanoid robot prototype:

There’s a new bot in town 🤖

Check this out (until the very end)!https://t.co/duFdhwNe3K pic.twitter.com/8pbhwW0WNc

— Tesla Optimus (@Tesla_Optimus) December 13, 2023

While the overall look is more refined, this new version of the robot also features all Tesla-designed actuators and sensors. The thing won’t be breaking speed records anytime soon, but it is at least moving in the range of usefulness. Tesla says that the robot is now able to walk 30% faster.

Optimus Gen 2 was also seen performing a squat while balancing itself. The hands also look well crafted – strong enough to handle weighty objects and delicate enough to handle more precise tasks.

The company said that it plans to start using the robot in its own manufacturing operations soon, and once it has proven its usefulness, Tesla plans to start selling the robot.

[source:electrek]