> Tesla, for example, is much more automated in many areas

By out-sourcing jobs to China.

> According to new figures released by the CPCA, Giga Shanghai was responsible for the production of 710,865 vehicles in 2022. And given Tesla sold 1,313,851 cars last year, that means 54.1 percent came from the Chinese plant

(I've worked on some automation projects for them)

They actually shoot themselves in the foot often.

They often over automate from the beginning, force too much, figure out it won't work, then just end up doing it how Ford does.

The closest I've seen to Tesla using more automation was just Musk spouting off random bullshit. Actual deep dives have shown that the automation tesla was trying to do isn't ready and they spent as long or longer fixing every car, often meaning they had lower output and more human involvement than competitors.

By what metric? The numbers I've seen indicates the opposite, although against European peers. But I don't know how reliable the numbers are, as the real data is probably a trade secret. The differences were really small however, and you might be able to slice them differently for a different result.

Their build quality issues and problems producing CyberTruck aren't exactly great advertisements for excessive automation.