Tesla's humanoid robot will>It is meant to perform repetitive tasks
Musk first announced the robot last summer at Tesla's AI Day, a series of tech talks hosted by the company to recruit machine learning talent. In the announcement, Musk brought an actor dressed in a body suit designed to look like the robot>It won't pose a threat to humans
Musk, who in the past has warned about the dangers of artificial intelligence, also said that the robot was being designed so that humans will be able to outrun it or overpower it were something to go wrong.
"As you see Optimus develop, everyone's going to make sure it's safe," Musk said earlier this month. "No Terminator stuff or that kind of thing."
The robot will be five foot eight inches tall and weigh 125 pounds, Tesla said. It will carry a maximum of 45 pounds, lift 150 pounds and will move at a maximum speed of 5 miles per hour. Its face will be a "screen for useful information."
Musk believes Optimus is Tesla's 'most important product'
Musk earlier this year ranked Optimus as a higher priority than other hotly anticipated Tesla products, including the Cybertruck pickup and the Tesla Semi.
It remains to be seen if Tesla will be able to deliver on Musk's promises, however. Gary Marcus, an AI researcher, told CNBC this month he was skeptical that Optimus could live up to the hype by 2023.
"Tesla has not even (after years of effort) come close to reliably solving one relatively simple task (driving); to claim that a robot that has never been shown publicly will solve all of human tasks in the next year or two is preposterous," he said.
