Elon Musk has unveiled plans for Tesla to develop a robot. Musk jokingly said that it will be designed to be "friendly," before going on to say that it would be mechanically limited to a 5mph speed "so you can outrun it."

Wanting to reassure investors that this wasn't a robot designed to take over the world - as predicted by just about every science fiction franchise ever - Musk showed off what the Tesla Bot would look like and what technical elements would go into it.

"Tesla is arguably the worlds biggest robotics company, because our cars are like semi-sentient robots on wheels," said Musk, presenting the Tesla Bot at the company's AI Day.

Tesla Bot photo 1
Tesla

Much of what will go into the Tesla Bot will come from systems developed for cars, with reference to the "full self-driving computer" and "Autopilot cameras". The Tesla Bot will stand at 5ft 8in tall and weight 125lbs (56kg).

The face of the Tesla Bot will be a screen to pass on useful information.

The aim of the Tesla Bot is to carry out dangerous and repetitive tasks, basically to do boring jobs, with Musk going on to say that he could foresee a future where manual labour became optional for people.

Tesla Bot photo 2
Tesla

There will an AI behind the new android, with Musk saying that you will be able to give it commands like "go to the store and get me the following groceries", but of course, it will need instructions to be useful.

Tesla is planning to show off the Tesla Bot in 2022.