No other major car-maker has been able to come close to Tesla when it comes to the sleekness of their software and (especially that) when it comes to the cars' autonomy, Tesla is in a class of its own. And it's not for lack of trying, the Germans have already poured tens of billions of euros (at least) into the EV market.

Autonomous driving is totally unrelated to EVs, an ICE powered car can be as (non-)autonomous as an EV one. There was a nice thread recently about Mercedes liability regarding "autonomous" driving.

Well, that the "sleakness2 of software is a thing now when it comes to cars might make an Apple car difficult, the "sleek software" crowd is covered already. And there I was build quality, ride comfort and maintenance costs were also important when it comes to cars... Stupid me. But then I'm German, not sure if me driving French and old British cars offsets my ingrained sense of superiority of German car brands.

But yes, I agree Tesla is on its own in tremendously over selling its self driving tech.

> No other major car-maker has been able to come close to Tesla when it comes to the sleekness of their software and (especially that) when it comes to the cars' autonomy

Nobody cares about the software besides HN type people and the average user puts something like 40 miles per day on their car.

A far cry from "strategic asset" for the west, but you sure can program the car to make fart noises when you honk...