We call on the European Commission, EU Member States and the Technical Committee – Motor Vehicles (TCMV) to approve Tesla’s supervised driver-assistance system — known internationally as Full Self-Driving (Supervised) and currently marketed in Europe as Tesla Assisted Driving (TAD) — across Europe without unnecessary Europe-only restrictions.

We ask Europe to give European drivers access to the same core capabilities available in the United States, except where an evidence-based safety requirement genuinely justifies a difference. We also ask Europe to allow the internationally recognised name Full Self-Driving (Supervised).

THIS IS NOT AUTONOMOUS DRIVING

Full Self-Driving (Supervised) does not make the vehicle autonomous.

The driver must remain attentive, supervise the system continuously, be ready to intervene immediately and remain legally responsible for the vehicle and for complying with traffic laws.

The question is therefore not whether Europe should allow unsupervised autonomous vehicles. It is whether European drivers should have access to an advanced supervised driver-assistance system, based on objective safety evidence.

EXTENSIVE EUROPEAN TESTING ALREADY EXISTS

The Dutch type-approval authority, RDW, assessed the system for more than 18 months.

Its evaluation included:

• more than 3,000 hours of testing;
• more than 1,000 test runs on tracks and public roads;
• complex urban traffic, different road types and adverse weather;
• data from approximately 1.8 million kilometres driven in Europe.
• RDW concluded that the system met the applicable requirements and granted a provisional EU type-approval.

Post-approval monitoring continued. RDW later reported that almost 40,000 vehicles had driven around 24 million kilometres in the Netherlands without relevant incidents.

Several other EU Member States have since accepted the Dutch provisional approval.

TECHNOLOGY-NEUTRAL RULES MUST APPLY EQUALLY

One of the clearest examples concerns speed selection.

European discussions have included proposals to restrict the speed a Tesla driver may select to only a small margin above the detected speed limit.

Yet German manufacturers Audi, BMW and Mercedes-Benz already offer supervised driver-assistance systems combining speed, distance and steering control at speeds up to 210 km/h.

Why should vehicles from Audi, BMW and Mercedes-Benz be allowed to use supervised driver assistance at speeds up to 210 km/h, while Europe considers limiting Tesla’s Max Speed Offset from up to 50% to just 10%, despite the driver remaining legally responsible in all cases?

This petition does not advocate speeding. Drivers must obey speed limits regardless of which assistance system they use.

The issue is regulatory consistency.

If the driver remains legally responsible in an Audi, BMW or Mercedes-Benz, why should that principle change in a Tesla?

KEEP THE INTERNATIONALLY RECOGNISED NAME

Tesla has changed the European name of Full Self-Driving (Supervised) to Tesla Assisted Driving following regulatory concerns.

But the name Full Self-Driving (Supervised) explicitly includes the word “Supervised”.

European consumers are capable of understanding that distinction.

EUROPE MUST STOP REGULATING ITSELF OUT OF THE FUTURE

The EU’s own competitiveness analysis has identified a widening innovation gap, difficulties in scaling technology companies and regulatory barriers that can make growth harder.

U.S.-based companies are at the frontier of artificial intelligence, space technology and advanced mobility.

In Europe, meanwhile, one of the most visible recent innovations experienced by consumers has been plastic bottle caps tethered to their bottles.

The contrast has become symbolic of a wider concern: while other regions focus on inventing, testing and scaling breakthrough technologies, Europe too often appears to focus first on restricting, modifying and regulating them.

Europe should not require successful technologies to be renamed, weakened or subjected to manufacturer-specific restrictions.

WHAT WE ARE ASKING FOR

We call on the European Commission, EU Member States, their TCMV representatives and national type-approval authorities to:

• Approve Full Self-Driving (Supervised) / Tesla Assisted Driving for EU-wide use.
• Give European drivers access to the same core capabilities available in the United States, unless clear safety evidence justifies a difference.
• Avoid Europe-specific reductions in functionality without objective safety justification.
• Do not impose Tesla-specific speed restrictions that are not applied under equivalent principles to comparable systems from other manufacturers.
• Apply technology-neutral regulation equally to Tesla, Audi, BMW, Mercedes-Benz and every other manufacturer.
• Allow the name “Full Self-Driving (Supervised)”.
• Take full account of RDW testing, European driving data and post-approval safety monitoring.

Europe should also allow innovation.

We therefore call on the European Commission and EU Member States to approve Full Self-Driving (Supervised) across Europe without unnecessary or discriminatory restrictions, and to give European drivers access to the same technological progress available elsewhere in the world.