Musk's Beijing visit seeks Tesla FSD approval

(ECNS) -- Elon Musk visited Beijing on Sunday afternoon at the invitation of China Council for the Promotion of International Trade.

Musk expressed his thanks for the hard work and intelligence of the Chinese team, saying Tesla is willing to deepen cooperation with China to "achieve more win-win results," according to CCTV.

He said this month that Tesla may make full self-driving (FSD) available to customers in China "very soon," in response to a query on X.

The China Association of Automobile Manufacturers said in a statement Sunday night that Tesla models produced by its Shanghai Gigafactory fully comply with the regulatory requirements of an authoritative national data inspection.

Tesla introduced FSD four years ago, yet it has not been implemented in China, its second-largest global market.

Analysts say autonomous driving has become a reassuring promise from Musk to his investors.

In the first quarter of this year, Tesla's revenue and net profit both declined, while its global delivery volume was significantly lower than Wall Street's expectations, at 386,800 vehicles, down 8.3 percent year-on-year and a staggering 20.1 percent decrease from the previous quarter.

Meanwhile, Chinese competitors like Xiaomi, Huawei, and BYD, all in the limelight at the ongoing Beijing International Automotive Exhibition, are developing quickly.

Leveraging extensive driving data, proprietary computing platforms, and immense computational power, Tesla's FSD has advanced to the V12.3 stage.

Tesla has said that FSD is just "a step away" from becoming a reality, and once implemented on a large scale, it will become a lucrative cash cow for the company.

Research suggests that if FSD enters the Chinese market, it will emerge as a formidable competitor to domestic autonomous driving solutions.