Editor’s Note: We’ve got a special treat for Bleeding Edge readers today…
Jeff is traveling today. So, instead of our usual fare, we’re unlocking some research for our Bleeding Edge subscribers. It’s from one of our paid-up advisory services – consider it a “sneak peek” into what’s going on behind the scenes at Brownstone Research.
It’s all about how artificial intelligence is giving rise to a major technological shift in an industry Jeff has written on extensively – autonomous vehicles.
Read on for this sneak peek from Jeff…
Nearly 600 years ago, Johannes Trithemius became the first recorded person to lose his job to technology.
Trithemius, a skilled scribe, copied books by hand. This changed in 1439 when Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press, revolutionizing the duplication of texts.
At that time, thousands of scholars and priests worked as scribes. They resisted the printing press vehemently.
Trithemius chose a more diplomatic approach. He authored a treatise titled “In Praise of Scribes,” defending the value of manuscripts.
He argued that printed books lacked the durability and aesthetic quality of handwritten texts. He feared that mechanical printing would degrade the quality of literature.
Others were more direct in their condemnation. Filippo de Strata, another scribe, called the printing press a “plague” and demanded its ban in Venice, blaming it for moral decline. He pondered if children would become corrupted by impure texts and if this would allow “errors” in information, intentional or mistaken, to spread.
These criticisms mirror those leveled against today’s large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT, which face scrutiny for hallucinations and biases.
The voices of those who fear technological advancements have echoed through the centuries, yet new technologies have continued to improve our lives.
Despite early resistance, the printing press is now hailed as one of history’s most significant inventions.
It catalyzed the Renaissance which transformed education, literacy, culture, politics, and economics. Displaced scribes adapted by becoming printers, editors, or teachers. Some even continued being scribes by crafting luxury editions of books.
We stand on the brink of another technological revolution that could displace millions of taxi, rideshare, and truck drivers in the U.S. alone. Full self-driving (FSD) and autonomous vehicles are less than a year away from widespread availability.
Despite resistance and sensationalized reports of accidents, these vehicles will prove to be over 10 times safer than human-driven ones. Some people will still want to drive their own cars or feel more comfortable with a human taxi driver, and that’s fine.
There will still be a place for human drivers. But we will see a continued adoption of this self-driving technology.
The proliferation of “robotaxis” and shared autonomous vehicle networks is imminent. Leaders in the space like Uber and Tesla are poised to leverage automation in self-driving vehicles, potentially saving billions in driver payments and significantly enriching its investors.
As longtime readers know well, the biggest trend on our radar by far right now is artificial intelligence (AI).
Some of us may think that AI is overhyped. After all, most of us haven’t seen any major differences in our day-to-day lives. We still have to cut the grass, the air conditioner still breaks down, we need to wash our dishes, and we still have to fold the laundry.
The LLM chatbots like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude are useful, but “they” still get some things wrong. And unless you’re a computer programmer using AI to debug or write software code, most aren’t yet getting the benefits of AI in their daily lives.
But for corporations and governments, it’s a different story. Companies are using AI to automate processes and reduce costs, serve more targeted ads to consumers, and expedite new drug discoveries. All profitable use cases.
But the near future holds massive change for normal people like us. We are on the verge of a massive breakthrough that will directly impact and improve our lives… and one industry primed for impactful change is autonomous vehicles.
Six billion miles.
That’s the distance Elon Musk estimates Tesla full self-driving (FSD) vehicles will need to traverse for worldwide regulatory approval.
To put six billion miles in perspective, that’s 240,954 trips around the Earth. This many miles are needed for two reasons:
By my calculations, they’ll reach the six-billion-mile mark before the end of March 2025. When that happens, we’ll see a tipping point in the perception of artificial intelligence. This turns the perception of AI from an interesting novelty to something that makes our lives materially better and safer.
After Tesla came out with its fourth-generation self-driving hardware system last year (HW4), I leased my own Tesla with FSD software. Before that, I would rent a Tesla periodically to test its self-driving capabilities.
I’m sure that some might think I’ve gone a bit overboard. Who would spend that kind of money just to research a technology? Well, my perspective is that Tesla’s self-driving technology is one of the most advanced forms of AI today.
And that’s a trend that I want to stay on top of.
Experiencing Tesla’s FSD technology and its pace of improvement is something that we won’t read about in the media, which tends to ignore or even denigrate what Musk and his team are doing.
I noticed a major change earlier last year in improvement, which is why I wanted to be able to test the technology with every release of new software.
I have my Tesla drive me around every week. And I have to say it’s quite incredible. It accelerates gently, takes turns smoothly, and navigates complex situations with no interference from me.
And as you might’ve read last week in The Bleeding Edge – Your Kids Will Never Have to Learn How to Drive, Tesla has recently rolled out its version 13 (v13) FSD software, which represents a significant leap toward Level 5 autonomy…
As a reminder, version 13 is the release of Tesla’s FSD software that has been planned to deliver fully autonomous driving technology – equivalent to what’s typically referred to as Level 5 autonomy.
And every time Tesla jumps from one major version of software – for example, from version 12 to version 13 – it’s a major upgrade of the artificial intelligence. It’s where I’ve always seen the largest jumps in performance.
[…]
And version 13 doesn’t disappoint. It’s stunning.
It represents another leap in the entire end-to-end, artificial neural network that enables full self-driving.
What’s striking about this release of the software is that there is no longer any hesitation in the software. It simply drives like a great human driver, consistently, knowing how to navigate every condition.
[…]
This technology is going to change the entire automotive industry. It will change the entire public transportation industry. And it will radically change the economics of road-based transportation.
Autonomy is the key.
Autonomy is what unlocks the revolution in transportation. Full autonomy will free up time, enhance productivity for both consumers and businesses and create an entirely new industry of safe, point-to-point autonomous transportation cheaper than any non-subsidized public transportation.
Tesla’s FSD capabilities are already extraordinary and make driving/riding so much easier and safer. Before the end of this year, FSD will be ready for widespread use. The data also proves this.
In the chart below, we can see that Tesla vehicles using its autopilot technology (which is a subset of FSD) drive millions of miles further than human drivers before an accident.
Source: Tesla
And we see autopilot is getting consistently better. An improvement that is 10x better than the alternative is hard to ignore. And as Tesla logs billions of miles more, the statistics will be that much more compelling, so compelling that regulatory approvals will follow around the world.
After all, Tesla is the closest to regulatory approval once it gets over the “supervision” requirement hurdle…
Tesla’s latest FSD software is still denoted as “Supervised” which means that the passenger in the driver’s seat still needs to stay alert and looking forward. Tesla’s software monitors the passenger in the driver’s seat via a camera in the rearview mirror assembly to ensure that they are paying attention and not sleeping or looking down at their smartphone.
But this is done for the explicit purpose of avoiding getting into regulatory trouble. The FSD software is now capable of hands-free unsupervised point-to-point transportation.
At this stage, the “Unsupervised” version has nothing to do with the software, it is determined by when a state, for example, gives the regulatory approval to offer unsupervised autonomous rides to consumers. The two most likely states to provide approval in 2025 are Texas and California.
Regulatory approval isn’t far off. With Texas and California paving the way, it won’t be long before other states follow suit, especially in light of the overwhelming safety data for Tesla’s FSD software.
The autonomous vehicles trend isn’t just about Tesla. Other companies like Waymo, Cruise, and most major car manufacturers won’t be far behind.
I focus on Tesla because they are the closest to unleashing true FSD and they have a grand vision for where it can go.
Tesla’s FSD software is, of course, designed for Tesla vehicles. And Musk has already shared that Tesla owners will be able to opt in their Teslas into a ride-hailing network so that their Teslas can go to work when they are not being used.
But not everyone will own a Tesla, but they’ll still be available through ride-hailing networks.
And Musk has gone so far as to say that he is open to licensing its FSD software to other automotive manufacturers.
The plan was always to go driverless. And that time is coming. Owning a car will be a luxury in the future. And in that future, the companies that spearheaded the transition from hands-on driving to autonomous vehicles will become invaluable.
Many people will completely rely on these autonomous vehicles for their transportation needs. And now, with the rollout of Tesla’s v13 FSD software, we’re closer than ever to that reality.
Regards,
Jeff
P.S. Tomorrow morning, December 17th, at 11 a.m. ET, Jeff has invited readers to join him in what he believes will be his biggest venture yet.
Technology is developing exponentially faster than anyone could have ever predicted. Industries are being disrupted. Entirely new ones are emerging. And hidden within this chaos are opportunities unlike anything we’ve encountered before.
Click here to get a copy of Jeff’s Top 5 Most Urgent Tech Breakthroughs now and join us tomorrow at 11 a.m. for Jeff’s big news.
The Bleeding Edge is the only free newsletter that delivers daily insights and information from the high-tech world as well as topics and trends relevant to investments.
The Bleeding Edge is the only free newsletter that delivers daily insights and information from the high-tech world as well as topics and trends relevant to investments.
