In the Q3 earnings call, Elon Musk revealed that Tesla (TSLA, Financial) will debut self-driving electric vehicles for ride-hailing in California and Texas by the middle of 2025 at the Cybercab event. While Tesla has suggested such a service before, this is actually the first time Musk has gotten into specifics. The service has been allegedly piloted among the Tesla employees in the area with safety drivers.

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Still, Tesla has grand objectivesto provide the world with phantoms of Full Self-Driving (FSD) vehiclesbut presently, their application is termed an enhanced driver-assistance system, which is different from the complete robotaxis used by Waymo. To date, all Teslas come with some form of supervision, and the technology cannot perform all the driving tasks from start to finish without Adjusting human interaction from time to time.

Having a driverless taxi service falls under this realm of chartered operations, which requires the following multi-tier approval process from both the DMV and the California Public Utilities Commission, with only Waymo legally allowed to have a commercial driverless taxi service in San Francisco. Musk complained about the problems with regulations in California and said that would not be the case in Texas moving forward.

Musk's announcement is also filtered through his previous track record of previous optimistic timelines regarding Tesla's self-driving capabilities that have been repeatedly missed. He also said the FSD hardware embedded in Tesla cars since 2019 may not be adequate for complete autonomy, but upgrades would be offered free of charge. This plan to launch the fully self-driving ride-hailing service is part of a long-term strategy to place Tesla company at the vanguard of the auto industry, but not without previous setbacks and numerous legal issues.

This article first appeared on GuruFocus.