After a three-year hiatus and owners complaining that its repeatedly recalled Full Self-Driving (FSD) is too expensive — an unaffordable $12,000 price tag, electric car maker Tesla is putting its Enhanced Autopilot (EAP) on the road Auxiliary packs come back to life.
EAP became available to U.S. customers last Friday. New and existing Tesla owners can add the option to their cars via OTA to enable features like Autopilot Navigation, Auto Lane Change, Auto Park and Summon. There’s a catch though: it costs $6,000.
Tesla has long used its Autopilot feature in different packages. Historically, EAP was sold as a stopgap between the Autopilot and Fully Self-Driving (FSD) packages, which included nearly all the features of an FSD, except for autonomous driving on city streets and traffic light and stop sign control.
That said, existing Tesla owners aren’t entirely convinced the $6,000 price tag is a good option, and many don’t jump at the opportunity to add EAP to their existing vehicles. Many owners on the TeslaMotors subreddit were particularly surprised by the price tag, which has increased by $1,000 since the feature set was last sold in April 2019. Others say that the features are underperforming or lack reliability.
Price is probably also the reason why EAP was reinstated by Tesla.
Last week, a Twitter user told CEO Elon Musk that the price of FSD was reported at $12,000. In addition, he also suggested that Tesla restore EAP as an intermediate layer between standard Autopilot and FSD.
That’s exactly what the automaker is doing now, but its current price of $6000 in the US is significantly higher than its $3500 (AU$5100) cost in Australia. Tesla also doesn’t currently offer EAP on a subscription model like FSD does, which may hinder adoption by existing owners.
Tesla has been feeling some cash squeeze lately. Musk recently said Tesla’s two newest factories in Texas and Germany are burning through billions of dollars as the company tries to stay afloat during a shortage of parts and batteries. Likewise, the Covid-19 restrictions at the Shanghai Gigafactory have not been kind to the company. Not to mention the various employee-related lawsuits against the automaker. EAP may be a channel for Tesla to make some cash in a tough quarter, but given consumer feedback, it feels very far off at the current price tag.
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