Not so fast with Elon Musk's grand vision of society being overrun by Tesla's (TSLA) humanoid robots, aka Optimus.
"Sometimes we have to call it what it is, right? I mean, have you seen this thing do anything? It's bulls**t," Meta's former VP of AI Jerome Pesenti told Yahoo Finance Executive Editor Brian Sozzi on his Opening Bid podcast (see the video above or listen here).
Pesenti is no stranger to the AI space and all of its challenges.
He joined the tech industry in 1998 and worked in AI for several major players, including IBM (IBM). Before founding AI-powered education platform Sizzle AI, he worked extensively on developing the Llama model for Meta (META).
Said Pesenti on fears of a robot-run society, "The real world is very complicated, and very unpredictable," adding one need not look any further than the autonomous driving industry to see the difficulties in bringing AI to life.
Contrast Pesenti’s sentiment with that of Musk, who introduced the first Optimus bots at an AI Day on Aug. 19, 2021.
The prototype soon followed, complete with the ability to walk on two legs, use its hands and arms, and perform a range of complex tasks. The Tesla CEO has ceremoniously declared that robotics would take over cars as the main money driver at the company over time.
The current iteration of Optimus is able to perform "simple" factory tasks, according to Musk.
"As I've said before, I think Optimus will be more valuable than everything else combined. Because if you've got a sentient humanoid robot that is able to navigate reality and do tasks at request, there is no meaningful limit to the size of the economy," Musk told investors on his late April earnings call.
On Monday, Musk wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, that "Tesla will have genuinely useful humanoid robots in low production for Tesla internal use next year and, hopefully, high production for other companies in 2026."
The billionaire has a track record of not meeting his deadlines.
Pesenti noted that humanoids “work well in factories when they have a small set of actions. They don’t wash our clothes. They don’t empty our dishwasher. They don’t fold the stuff,” he said.
There is a business case for them, though, reasons Goldman Sachs.
The total addressable market for humanoid robots is projected to reach $38 billion by 2035, up more than sixfold from a previous projection of $6 billion, according to recent research from Goldman Sachs analyst Jacqueline Du.
Goldman Sachs says that there’s been significant progress in end-to-end AI, through which models can train themselves, removing the need for a human engineer to code everything by hand.
As a result, that's speeding up robot development, allowing the machines to perform more tasks and adapt to new situations (such as working outside of factories) more quickly.
Rather than channeling Musk with AI robots, Pesenti is sticking with his software roots.
Pesenti created Sizzle after tutoring his children during COVID-19 lockdowns. An "aha" moment led him to create a free, accessible AI tutoring service.
He told Yahoo Finance the company has 12 employees, has raised millions in capital, and is focused on bringing new features to market.
Pesenti has plenty of optimism, even as AI has a long way to go. “The funny thing about AI is the more progress we make, the more we realize the goal is further away,” he said.
Three times each week, Yahoo Finance Executive Editor Brian Sozzi fields insight-filled, market-focused conversations and chats with the biggest names in business on Opening Bid. Find more episodes on our video hub. Watch on your preferred streaming service. Or listen and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you find your favorite podcasts.
In the below Opening Bid episode, EMJ Capital founder Eric Jackson reveals why the big-time rally in shares of Nvidia (NVDA) is just getting started.
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