Investing.com -- Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) shares surged in Thursday, after the company announced plans to launch its so-called "full self-driving" advanced driver assistance software in China and Europe next year should it receive regulatory approval.
In a social media post, Tesla AI, an affiliate of the electric carmaker, laid out a release roadmap that included the potential rollout of full self-driving -- or FSD -- technology in the two regions in the first quarter of 2025. Tesla CEO Elon Musk had previously said that he expected FSD to be unveiled in Europe, China and elsewhere by the end of this year.
FSD is currently available to customers in the US and Canada, although it has been subject to heavy regulatory and legal scrutiny. In a note to clients on Wednesday, analysts at Piper Sandler said it is "worth monitoring" whether a "performance gap" exists between the FSD system on Tesla's 3rd-generation and more recent 4th-generation hardware. But they said if Tesla can "solve FSD," they do not believe "investors will care."
The launch of FSD is seen as particularly crucial in the lucrative and highly competitive Chinese auto market, where Tesla is racing to keep up with similar driving assistance systems being developed by domestic rivals. China is the US company's biggest foreign market, although it has been hit by weak economic activity and downbeat consumer sentiment in the country as well as an elongated price war.
Earlier this week, Tesla said it had sold 63,000 cars in China in August -- its best month so far this year, but likely still lower than the total of 64,694 sold in the same month in 2023. The return was also far below that of BYD (SZ:002594), the world's largest electric vehicle manufacturer, which clocked a 35% jump in China passenger car sales in August to an all-time monthly high of 370,854.
Tesla was up more than 4% in recent Thursday trading.
(Scott Kanowsky contributed to this story)