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IT Home reported on October 29 that a South Korean court dismissed a lawsuit brought by dozens of Tesla owners seeking refunds from the automaker on the grounds that it had failed to deliver FSD driver-assistance technology on time.
The 89 plaintiffs each sought up to 9 million won (IT Home note: approximately 45,261 yuan at the current exchange rate), saying they could not make full use of Tesla’s FSD package. The Seoul Central District Court rejected their claims on Thursday, finding that Tesla had already delivered some features to users through updates to its now-discontinued Autopilot driver-assistance software.
Judge Kim Seok-beom said: “The defendant is obliged to deliver technically feasible autonomous-driving features within the limits permitted by domestic and international regulatory and legal frameworks, and the plaintiffs have in fact received some of the features included in the FSD package.”
The ruling is good news for Tesla. The company is trying to secure approval for more FSD features outside North America, after the software and the way it has been promoted drew opposition from regulators. Tesla recently revised the wording it uses to describe some driver-assistance technology as it seeks approval in markets including Europe.
Tesla has sold the FSD option in South Korea since 2017, but regulatory requirements and restrictions on software deployment have prevented some local owners from using core features such as city navigation and automatic parking.
Bryan Seo, a Tesla Korea executive, said at a parliamentary audit this month that, of the approximately 230,000 Teslas on South Korean roads, about 45,000 are capable of running FSD features.
He explained that, under a bilateral trade agreement, vehicles manufactured in the United States can enable FSD features in South Korea, while Chinese-made models, which account for a larger share of the South Korean market, need explicit government approval before the technology can be activated.
The owners filed their lawsuit in 2024, arguing that Tesla had failed to deliver the promised features within a reasonable time, breaching its contractual obligations under South Korean civil law.
The court ruled that Tesla was required to deliver FSD features only to the extent permitted by law, and that buyers understood there was no definite deadline for their rollout; therefore, the delay did not constitute a breach of contract.
Hwang Yoon Koo, a lawyer representing the owners, said the ruling was flawed and rested on an erroneous finding of fact. He argued that the FSD package could not function properly in the plaintiffs’ vehicles without replacing hardware such as cameras. Making consumers bear the consequences of the seller’s failure to obtain regulatory approval, he said, runs counter to general principles of contract law.