Munich, Germany — Tesla CEO, Elon Musk is known for his bold, far-fetched statements regarding the capabilities and technological advancements of his company’s vehicles.
Most recently Musk has suggested Level 5 Tesla autonomous vehicles are “very close” and “basic functionality” should be complete this year. Over the last few months Musk has been throwing around phrases such as “full autonomy” and “self-driving” to the driver-assist systems in its vehicles.
However, he may have gone too far this time—after Munich’s Regional Court banned all future use of Tesla’s use of the controversial “Autopilot” and “Full Self Driving” tag names in Germany.
Calling both “misleadingly prohibited”, the Court banned continued use of both names, due to the fact that Tesla’s promise of Full Self Driving to “drive autonomously by the end of 2019” would contain illegal driving functions in Germany.
Tesla has the right to appeal, but has since rebranded “Autopilot” as “Autodrive” in Germany.
The case was brought before the court (the docket is: LG Muenchen, 33 O 14041/19) by Germany’s non-profit Competition Center.
The Court ruled Tesla had improperly claimed its cars had full-self driving, or autonomous driving features, which the court instead categorized as Level 2 driving assistance.
