Tesla Begins Commercial Manufacturing of Optimus Humanoid Robots

Tesla has repurposed part of its Fremont, California car factory to start manufacturing commercial-grade Optimus humanoid robots. The massive shift in financial investment toward robotics and artificial intelligence has taken a toll on the company's financial balance sheet. As TechCrunch reported, Tesla's quarterly profits fell by 43 percent to $787 million as spending surged while electric car sales remained flat.

For average consumers, this pivot illustrates how corporate focus is shifting toward futuristic automation, even if practical benefits remain years away. Elon Musk told investors that Tesla aims to manufacture 20,000 robots weekly by late 2027, but he admitted that the current hardware and software still require extensive updates to ensure they are durable and safe enough for open-ended tasks.

What remains unclear is whether general purpose physical robots can ever generate enough actual revenue to offset continuous spending hits, or if the push is largely designed to keep investors engaged as automobile growth slows down. Software delays also continue to affect other projects, with executive Ashok Elluswamy noting on an earnings call that fully unsupervised self-driving software has been pushed back to mid-2027.