An icon in the shape of a lightning bolt. Impact Link Joel Angel Juarez/REUTERS There were some bumps in the road. After a decade of waiting, Tesla launched a limited self-driving car service in Austin. The first Tesla robotaxi rides were available on Sunday to a small group of invited users for a flat fee of $4.20 (surely not a coincidence). For now, the service is geofenced to avoid Austin's more challenging intersections. The cars came with a passenger already buckled in — a Tesla employee as a safety precaution. In footage seen by BI, there appeared to be no significant intervention from the supervisor. The vehicles did several things right, but the rollout wasn't without its hiccups. One video showed a passenger being driven across double yellow lines into the wrong lane, prompting a car behind to honk at it. During the same ride, the robotaxi also exceeded the 35-mph speed limit on multiple occasions. While the rollout used the current Tesla Model Y, sources told BI the company is building a modified version of the car for its robotaxi fleet. The project, internally referred to as "Halo," involves cars with self-cleaning cameras and extra protection for the cameras to prevent damage and debris, one insider said. The rollout came at a turbulent time for Musk. At the end of March, Tesla capped its worst quarter since 2022 amid protests at its showrooms. Then, earlier this month, Tesla stock plummeted more than 14% following a very embittered, very public falling out between Elon Musk and US President Donald Trump. Competition is also fierce. Waymo has such cabs in several cities, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Austin. They don't require human supervisors to be present, and their service range in Austin is about twice the size of Tesla's current operating limits. Their technology differs, too. Tesla relies on a set of cameras mounted on its vehicles, rather than expensive radar and lidar sensors used by Waymo. This is in part why Musk expects Tesla's purpose-built Cybercab to sell for less than $30,000. Waymo, meanwhile, retrofits existing vehicles with its technology, which can result in a list price as high as $70,000. Although the robotaxi arrived years later than promised, Tesla's rollout was a critical step for Musk's ambitions to make an Uber-like network of autonomous vehicles. The company's stock price leapt 8% when the markets opened on Monday, causing Musk's net worth to jump by $19 billion. 3 things in markets