Catching up to Waymo won't be easy because it has partnered with Uber Technologies, which operates the world's largest ride-hailing network with 170 million monthly users. It could take Tesla years to achieve that level of scale, especially if it builds its own mobility network from scratch.

A group of investors reached out to board chair Robyn Denholm to try and get Musk back to work at the beleaguered EV maker.

Musk didn’t elaborate on how new Tesla EVs will make their way to customers. At the beginning of the year, the automaker posted two videos showing newly built cars driving unsupervised on a 1.2-mile route from the Fremont factory to their designated dock lanes.