Tesla in Talks to Deploy Rural Robotaxis Near Berlin

The German state of Brandenburg is in talks with Tesla about deploying Robotaxis in remote regions, transport minister Robert Crumbach said, a plan that would use the vehicles as rural transit rather than city ride-hailing.

Crumbach confirmed the discussions in an interview with Märkische Allgemeine. “Where a regular bus does not run at all, or only twice a day for lack of demand, a driverless shuttle could step in,” he said. “We are currently in talks with companies such as Tesla.” The idea is to fold those trips into Brandenburg’s existing on-demand Rufbus network so people in thin-service villages can reach school, training, doctors, and shops.

That is a different Robotaxi use case than Tesla’s urban Cybercab staging in Dallas and Austin. A statewide rural rollout would treat Robotaxi as infrastructure for places with little public transport, a market that includes large parts of Germany and similar remote regions in the U.S. and Europe. If the model spreads, it could connect tens of millions of people who now have little or no bus service. Crumbach said Brandenburg is mainly a mediator and a driver of the idea, and that once legal approvals and permits are in place he can picture a statewide rural deployment.

People in some parts of the state will still need a car, he said, but the government has to look after residents who cannot drive themselves, including older people and students. Today’s Rufbus service is often too rigid, tied to standby hours and a shortage of drivers. Verkehrsverbund Berlin-Brandenburg describes those on-demand trips as line buses, minibuses, or taxis booked as needed.

Tesla has not publicly confirmed a Brandenburg contract, and consumer Full Self-Driving (Supervised) is still waiting on German regulators. The company already runs a public FSD shuttle pilot in Rhineland-Palatinate’s Eifelkreis Bitburg-Prüm and supervised ride-alongs in Switzerland. Gigafactory Berlin-Brandenburg sits in Grünheide in the same state. Hardware 4 cars currently run FSD (Supervised) v14.3.7 and Hardware 3 owners use FSD (Supervised) v14.1 Lite through 2026.21.6.