#autonomous-vehicles

#autonomous-vehicles

Uber had a substantial driverless car project more than a decade ago. That's right. It launched in early 2015 when Travis Kalanick was CEO. At the time, Uber was a real contender, racing against Waymo and Tesla. Then, disaster struck. While testing in Arizona in 2018, an Uber driverless car, with a safety driver behind the wheel, hit and killed a pedestrian.

I'm a driver, if I get a minor in my car, I can be deactivated, or if we have an accident with a minor, it can be a huge, huge problem. So, I believe Waymo have to follow the same rules that we have.

Waymo's incursion into the U.S. rideshare narrative reminds us of the Kool-Aid commercials from our childhood. The Kool-Aid man kicks down walls, causes havoc, screams 'oh yeah,' and runs off into the next scene. In the case of Waymo, they're kicking down the walls of an entrenched industry, wreaking terror on the multiples, and then running off to the next city announcement.

Tesla is reportedly designing its Cybercab production line to manufacture hundreds of the autonomous vehicles each week once mass production begins. The effort is underway at Gigafactory Texas in Austin as the company prepares to start building the Robotaxi at scale.

Uber Technologies isn't trying to build autonomous vehicles. It's trying to be the road every AV company drives on. The strategy is to become the distribution layer for the autonomous vehicle era, the app that passengers open regardless of whose robot is doing the driving.

AVs [autonomous vehicles] amplify the fundamental strengths of our platform, global scale, deep demand density, sophisticated marketplace technology, and decades of on-the-ground experience matching riders, drivers, and vehicles, all in real time.

L.A. Metro transit ambassadors are making Metro trains and buses safer and more welcoming. SBLA speaks with real life ambassadors, and Madelyn Brozen, co-author of a recent UCLA study that found ambassadors are improving Metro riders' experiences.