Jason Calacanis, the investor who turned a $25 million blog sale into stakes in Uber and Robinhood, recently declared that Tesla’s true legacy will not be its electric vehicles but the Optimus humanoid robot. He toured Tesla’s robotics studio twice in January and predicts Elon Musk will build a billion units of Optimus, envisioning a potential $10 trillion market opportunity in physical AI. Calacanis’s remarks underscore Tesla’s shift from automotive manufacturing into robotics, leveraging its neural networks, computer vision and in-house AI training infrastructure to aim for scale in labor-replacement applications across manufacturing, hospitality and domestic services.

Internal election filings reviewed by Handelsblatt reveal that Tesla’s Gigafactory near Berlin has reduced its workforce from 12,415 employees in 2024 to 10,703 today—a net decline of 1,712 roles. The breakdown shows decreases across genders, with female headcount falling from 1,788 to 1,683 and male staff from 10,616 to 9,006, while non-binary representation edged up by three positions. These cuts follow a 10 percent staffing reduction in 2024 and contrast with Tesla’s public assurances of stable employment, raising questions about demand pressures in European markets where sales plunged nearly 50 percent last year.

Billionaire Peter Thiel’s hedge fund, Thiel Macro, has fully exited Nvidia and now dedicates 39 percent of its capital to Tesla, with the remainder split between Microsoft and Apple. Over the past year, the fund outperformed the S&P 500 by 16 percentage points. Thiel’s bullish allocation to Tesla reflects confidence in the company’s autonomous driving and robotics ambitions—despite a 5 percent drop in EV market share—as well as expectations that Tesla’s vision-only full self-driving strategy and long-term Optimus development could unlock multitrillion-dollar markets in mobility and physical AI.