A recent quarterly earnings report from Tesla resulted in a lot -of media coverage surrounding the company's financials and, frankly, its role in the future of the electric vehicle industry.

But Tesla has a lot of irons in the fire and CEO Elon Musk has been stressing the importance of the company’s ambitions when it comes to autonomous vehicles and other technologies – including AI.

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When General Motors paid nearly $1 billion for autonomous driving startup Cruise in 2017, it had grand plans for self-driving taxis. The automaker has made a lot of progress since then but things are still not coming together like it had surely hoped they would.

The latest setback from Cruise came this week when GM CEO Mary Barra told shareholders in a letter that the company’s autonomous driving segment would simplify its path to scale by focusing on the next generation of the Chevy Bolt instead of the Origin, the six-person driverless shuttle bus debuted in 2020.

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The Racer is optimized for a cruise speed of more than 400 km/h (250 mph), which is impressive when you consider that a civilian helicopter's cruising speed typically ranges from 110 to 160 mph—military choppers can average around 200 mph. However, the Racer wants speed but with cost-efficiency and mission performance. For example, Airbus says the Racer's unique engine and aerodynamic optimization could realize a fuel consumption reduction of around 20% compared to current helicopters in the same weight category.

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