Tesla Inc. received permission from state regulators this week to begin a charter service that will use Tesla-employed drivers to ferry its employees in company-owned vehicles for prearranged rides, a step toward its plans for driverless Tesla taxis.
The California Public Utilities Commission, one of the state regulators that oversees hired vehicles, granted Tesla approval for what is known as a “transportation charter-party carrier” permit on Tuesday, acting on a November 2024 application from the company, according to Calmatters.
The permit does not allow Tesla to operate a rideshare service like Uber or Lyft, nor does it give Tesla permission to run driverless taxis. And Tesla hasn’t applied for permitting for either of those functions.
“The only reasonable explanation I can come up with for why they’ve got this (permit) is to allow them to test some of the operational backend services required to run a mobility service,” said Sam Abuelsamid, vice president of market research at communications firm Telemetry and an auto industry analyst.
To eventually provide rideshare services – with or without a driver – Tesla would need software that allows riders to request a ride, send out a vehicle to meet them, and take that rider to their destination. This charter service permit, Abuelsamid said, may be a way for the company to test out this kind of software.
