A court in Munich has reportedly deemed Tesla’s driver-assistance system a “massive danger.”
The mid-level court of the state of Bavaria ruled that the company has to reimburse most of the original price (approximately 112,000 Euro) of the Model X, according to Der Spiegel. The ruling reportedly refers to all Model X cars with the current version of Tesla’s autopilot.
The case specifically cites the car’s inability to recognize modified construction areas in cities as a reason for the ruling, Der Spiegel reported. Additionally, the court reportedly found that Tesla cars’ tendency to continuously brake in cities increases the danger of rear-end crashes due to smaller safety distances between cars. (RELATED: US Opens Probe Into Tesla Autopilot Feature After Multiple Crashes Nationwide)
That issue is better in latest Autopilot software rolling out now & fully fixed in August update as part of our long-awaited Tesla Version 9. To date, Autopilot resources have rightly focused entirely on safety. With V9, we will begin to enable full self-driving features.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 10, 2018
Tesla’s lawyers reportedly argued that the autopilot was not made for cities, and is only intended to be used on highways. However, the court countered that manually switching off the assistance system provides a distraction for drivers. (RELATED: Tesla ‘Autopilot’ Car Hits Police Officer On Motorcycle)
The head of Tesla’s autopilot team, Andrej Karpathy, left the company on July 13, the Financial Times (FT) reported. Tesla closed a major development office in late June, laying off more than 200 employees working on its driver-assistance technology, according to Reuters.
It’s been a great pleasure to help Tesla towards its goals over the last 5 years and a difficult decision to part ways. In that time, Autopilot graduated from lane keeping to city streets and I look forward to seeing the exceptionally strong Autopilot team continue that momentum.
— Andrej Karpathy (@karpathy) July 13, 2022
Earlier in 2022, Tesla CEO Elon Musk claimed to FT the company is “actually quite close to achieving self-driving at a safety level that is better than human.”