Elon Musk's Cybercab Gets Major Boost As Trump's NHTSA Proposes Amendment To Safety Standards

Elon Musk‘s Cybercab goals may have gotten a major boost as the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has proposed amendments to the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS). NHTSA Proposes Amended Safety Standards The agency, in a filing on Monday, proposed amending the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard (FMVSS) No. 102, which dictates “Transmission shift position sequence, starter interlock, and transmission braking effect.” The amendments outline that AVs without a steering wheel and pedals would not need to have a gear position indicator. “As the transmission shift position display does not fulfill the same safety need in an ADS-equipped vehicle without manually operated driving controls, the amendment will not impact vehicle safety,” NHTSA said in the filing. The change would not affect traditional vehicles. Tesla Cybercab The amendment could provide a major boost to Musk’s Cybercab, which will have no steering wheel or pedals and is set to enter production at the company’s Gigafactory in Texas. The company is also reportedly setting up the production line to produce hundreds of Cybercab units every week. Musk had earlier confirmed that the vehicle would be available for a price of around $30,000 or less, as Tesla revealed the first production-ready version of the vehicle on social media. The billionaire had earlier shared that the production of the vehicle would be “agonizingly slow” at first, before ramping up. How This Could Affect Waymo? The amendments to the safety standards could also affect Alphabet Inc.‘s (NASDAQ:GOOGL) (NASDAQ:GOOG) Waymo. While the service hasn’t revealed any plans for a Robotaxi without a steering wheel or pedals, the amendments could push the company to develop the technology as a vehicle without the aforementioned components could be significantly cheaper to produce. Waymo currently offers robotaxis built with British carmaker Jaguar and has partnerships in place with Chinese automaker Zeekr and South Korea’s Hyundai. Nvidia’s AV Push Elsewhere, NVIDIA Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA) shared that its self-driving technology was being adopted by Tesla’s Chinese rivals BYD Co. Ltd. (OTC:BYDDY) (OTC:BYDDF) and Geely Automobile Holdings Ltd. (OTC:GELHY) (OTC:GELYF). The chipmaker also shared an updated version of the Alpamayo self-driving suite. According to Benzinga Edge Rankings, Tesla scores well on the Momentum metric and also offers a favorable price trend in the Long term. Price Action: TSLA declined 0.03% to $395.45 during overnight trading on Tuesday. Check out more of Benzinga’s Future Of Mobility coverage by following this link.