Tesla will launch the "world's most advanced" in-vehicle computer, and the price of domestically produced Teslas will drop by up to 250,000 yuan

Tesla claims that it currently has the "world's most advanced" self-driving car computer, which it will apply to its vehicles next year.

Pete Bannon of Tesla's technical team confirmed in a recent earnings call that the company has produced autonomous driving chips and is currently being configured in road test vehicles.

Bannon said the chip will be included in the new hardware 3 suite of the Autopilot system, called Autopilot 3.0, which will replace the old onboard computer that powers the current Autopilot 2.0 and 2.5, which have been in production since October 2016.

Musk said the in-vehicle computer developed by the company is orders of magnitude better than anything currently available.

The Autopilot 2.0 hardware suite is powered by Nvidia GPUs and can process at 200 frames per second. Tesla's Autopilot 3.0 hardware, by comparison, processes at 2,000 frames per second and has redundancy.

Bannon and Musk reiterated that the new computer will be used as an upgrade for the current Autopilot 2.0 (and higher) versions, and car owners only need to replace the onboard computer.

Bannon said the hardware upgrade is expected to be scheduled for next year. Meanwhile, Tesla still plans to improve the Autopilot system on current hardware and launch version 9.0 software in the next "four weeks."

Recently, Tesla announced its Shanghai factory plan. The Shanghai factory has an annual production capacity of 500,000 vehicles, and it is estimated that it may take five years to start full production.

Currently, domestic consumers who purchase an imported Model S not only need to pay for transportation costs, loading and unloading costs, 40% tariffs and value-added tax, but also need to pay an additional purchase tax of about 10% after deducting the value-added tax, because Tesla uses a unique charging system and is not included in the "Catalogue of New Energy Vehicle Models Exempted from Vehicle Purchase Tax".

The above costs mean that a Model S that sells for $80,000 in the United States will ultimately cost $140,000 in China.

In the future, if domestic consumers directly purchase the Model S produced in the Shanghai factory, they will not only save $3,600 in shipping costs, but also 40% of the tariff (about $30,400). On this basis, the value-added tax required to pay for the whole vehicle will also be reduced accordingly. In this way, a "localized" Model S will save about $36,000, equivalent to RMB 250,000.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.