Tesla has announced that its innovative Actually Smart Summon (ASS) feature will soon be available for legacy Model S and Model X vehicles by the end of 2024. This significant update reflects Tesla’s commitment to enhancing the capabilities of older models, allowing drivers to summon their vehicles remotely from parking spots without human intervention.
What is Actually Smart Summon (ASS)?
The name “Actually Smart Summon” (abbreviated as ASS) was chosen by Tesla as a humorous nod that aligns with the playful branding of its electric vehicle lineup. Actually Smart Summon was specifically developed to enhance the efficiency of vehicle retrieval.
The Tesla mobile app, allows owners to call their cars which is very helpful if one is carrying several items in a busy parking lot. The feature offers two primary options:
- COME TO ME: This option is similar to real self-driving where users have to press a button in the app and the car will drive to the user’s current location.
- GO TO TARGET: Users can also specify a particular point of interest for the car and the car will drive itself to the identified point.
Also, ASS shows the actual time video feed of the vehicle from the built-in cameras to the Tesla Moblie App. Besides serving a safety purpose, this feature is sure to boost the confidence of users as the Vehicle navigates its way to the user.
Tesla’s Much-Awaited ‘Actually Smart Summon’ Feature Or ASS Is Here
Great News to Model S/X Owners of the Past Years
Tesla recently announced that Actually Smart Summon will be made available to legacy Model S and Model X cars by the end of 2024. This update is significant because it shows a willingness to bring features to older car models. They plan for it to roll out in Q4 of the year 2024 which comes after the latest FSD (Full Self Driving) v12.3.4 update that also contained improvements for these old cars.
Despite previous fears that newer Model S and X outfitted with older hardware would not be able to incorporate the feature, legacy Model S and X owners can look forward to this finally coming to the cars. More importantly, some of these vehicles would require upgrades in order to accommodate live camera feeds for the proper functioning of ASS.
This step not only adds value to the older models of the Tesla cars but also strengthens Tesla’s commitment of proper care and upgrade of its technology in all the cars it produces. While car companies try to come up with newer models of cars, owners of older models of cars should also stand to benefit from existing advances enjoyed by owners of new Teslas.
Technical Improvements
Notably, this is one of the major enhancements of ASS over its earlier model; with the new model fully depending on cameras rather than ultrasonic sensors. The old version of Smart Summon was also criticized mainly due to its quality – the feature failed to deliver stable performance, especially in complex scenarios, and could become unpredictable at times. Effecting this transition to a vision-only system yields improved object recognition and the overall understanding of the physical environment to ASS.
The new system draws from Tesla’s millions of developmental neural network training miles which have been trained in real-world driving conditions. This will enable ASS to deal with many cases in a better way including how to avoid an obstacle, how to avoid pedestrians, and how to make reasonable decisions based on what it sees.
It also means that users performing the summoning action can expect more fluidity and better efficacy from their cars.
