Just like OpenAI/Anthropic vs open models it's way too early to call winners or losers in the self-driving market. I called it a Tesla R&D project on purpose. They are at least in 2nd place to Waymo but it's barely a market in 2026, Waymo has been very conservative with expansion the last 5yrs for a good reason. It was still R&D.

Ramping up Cybercab production is definitely high risk play. Which is counter to OP's point that Tesla is now just some boring non-visionary company, especially combined investments in humanoid robots and semiconductors.

If Tesla was just looking to make safe easy money they wouldn't be making huge gambles on new markets.