Elon Musk Meets High-ranking Officials In Beijing To Discuss The Development Of Full Self-Driving Technology

Tesla CEO Elon Musk arrives in Beijing (photo: x @cctv)

JAKARTA - Tesla CEO Elon Musk arrived in Beijing on Sunday, April 28, on an unannounced visit. He is expected to meet with top officials of the country to discuss the launch of Full Self-Driving software and permission to transfer data overseas.

China's state media reported that Musk met with Prime Minister Li Qiang in Beijing. Li told Musk that Tesla's development in China could be considered a successful example of US-China economic and trade cooperation.

The US electric vehicle company rolled out Full Self-Driving, or FSD, the most autonomous version of its Autopilot software, four years ago but hasn't made it available in China yet, its second-largest market globally, although customers are pushing it to do so.

Musk said this month Tesla might make FSD available to customers in China "soon," in response to questions on social media platform X.

China's automotive concurrent pes like Xpeng has been trying to gain an edge over Tesla by launching similar software.

Musk plans to get approval to transfer data collected overseas to train algorithms for his autonomous driving technology, the person said.

CCTV broadcaster, in his report on Musk's meeting with Li, did not say whether the two had discussed FSD, or data.

Earlier in the day, separate reports broadcast by state radio said Li had visited Beijing's ongoing automotive exhibition and had commented on how China's smart new energy vehicle (NEV) sector has gained pole position in the market and that the country must work hard and maintain its lead.

Musk also met with Ren Hongbin, a government official who served as Chairman of China's International Trade Promotion Council, organizer of Beijing's automotive exhibition.

"It's good to see electric vehicles make progress in China. All cars will be electric in the future," Musk said in a video posted on social media by users affiliated with state media.

Musk's visit comes just over a week after he canceled a planned visit to India to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi, citing "A very large Tesla obligation."

The company said this month that it would cut ties to 10% of its total global workforce as it faces falling sales and increasingly intense price competition for EVs led by Chinese brands.

US auto safety regulators said on Friday they had opened an investigation to determine whether Tesla's recall of more than 2 million vehicles in the US announced in December to install new Autopilot protection was adequate after a series of accidents.

Landing In Beijing

A Gulfstream private jet with the tail number N272BG, registered for Falcon Landing, a company linked to SpaceX and Tesla, landed at Beijing International Airport on Sunday at 0603 GMT, according to China's flight tracking app, Flight Manager.

Another jet listed under Falcon Landing is N628TS, which is Musk's main jet used to travel to China during his last visit nearly a year ago, when he met Chinese government officials in Beijing and visited Tesla's plant in Shanghai.

Tesla has sold more than 1.7 million cars in China since entering the market a decade ago and the Shanghai plant is the largest worldwide.

Musk's visit coincided with the Beijing automotive exhibition, which opened last week and ended on May 4. Tesla does not have a booth at China's largest automotive exhibition and will last attend the event in 2021.

GM CEO Mary Barra made an unexpected visit to the exhibition at the world's largest automotive market on Friday, according to two people who knew the schedule. GM did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Also on Friday, Grace Tao, vice president of Tesla in charge of external relations in China, published a comment on social media accounts from state media People's Daily, arguing that autonomous driver technology would be a new growth engine for the EV industry.

Tao said in the article that Tesla leads research and development of autonomous drivers with "neural network end-to-end" technology and data collected from millions of cars on the road.

China's complicated traffic conditions with more pedestrians and cyclists than in many other markets provide more key scenarios for training autonomous driver algorithms more quickly, industry experts say.

Musk said last week that Tesla would introduce new cheaper models using current EV platforms and production lines and would offer new "robotaxi" with self-driving technology. He said in a post on X this month that he would reveal robotaxi on August 8.