Tesla CEO Elon Musk took to Twitter just now to announce the “gradual” rollout of the electric car company’s new Autopilot 8.0. It is the first update to the semi-autonomous software since a Tesla driver was killed while using Autopilot in May.
Elon Musk says ‘gradual’ rollout of new Tesla Autopilot starts tonight
is transportation editor with 10+ years of experience who covers EVs, public transportation, and aviation. His work has appeared in The New York Daily News and City & State.
V8.0 starts downloading tonight. Release will be gradual to make sure there aren't small regressions. Many car configs, many environments.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 21, 2016
This is an over-the-air software update, though, not the hardware update that reportedly is also in the works to add more cameras and radar sensors to its vehicles. Earlier this month, Musk wrote in a blog post, “After careful consideration, we now believe [radar] can be used as a primary control sensor without requiring the camera to confirm visual image recognition.”
Musk first announced the software update August 31st, but its release was delayed by the explosion of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket September 1st.
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