Electric car maker Tesla is on the verge of delivering fully driverless cars this year, billionaire CEO Elon Musk said on Thursday, his latest vision for the future following a series of bold and failed predictions about the long awaited technology

WHAT WE DON’T KNOW

It’s not clear whether Musk’s vision on driverless cars will come about on his timeline. The billionaire has a storied history of failed predictions in this area—and others—and regularly predicts fully driverless vehicles are just around the corner. A number of technical breakthroughs are still needed to realize fully driverless cars and experts are divided as to when they believe this might actually happen. Deploying the technology will be a different matter entirely, and the tech raises a host of legal and regulatory issues that have yet to be addressed with anything close to the thoroughness that will be needed for autonomous vehicles to take to the streets.

VALUATION

$251.1 billion. That’s how much Forbes estimates Musk is worth, according to our real time tracker. Large parts of Musk’s wealth come from his stake in Tesla, which is one of several valuable companies he cofounded. Others include rocket firm SpaceX, brain interface company Neuralink and tunneling enterprise Boring Company. He controversially acquired social media platform Twitter for $44 billion in 2022.