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      Waymo kills off autonomous trucking program

      news.movim.eu / ArsTechnica · Thursday, 27 July, 2023 - 17:33 · 2 minutes

    A Waymo Via truck. Check out all that self-driving equipment on the front.

    Enlarge / A Waymo Via truck. Check out all that self-driving equipment on the front. (credit: Waymo)

    Google's cost cutters are taking another bite out of Waymo. After being hit by layoffs that cut 8 percent of staff, it now looks like the self-driving truck program—Waymo Via—is dead. Waymo's announcement blog post tries to put a brave face on things, saying the company is "Doubling down on Waymo One," its ride-hailing service, but also mentions that the company will "push back the timeline on our commercial and operational efforts on trucking, as well as most of our technical development on that business unit."

    Google kills product

    View more stories Waymo says it will somehow "continue" its partnership with big rig manufacturer Daimler Truck North America (that's where the big, blue Waymo Via truck came from), but Waymo's actions paint a different picture. TechCrunch's Kirsten Korosec reports that "the vast majority of employees on Waymo’s trucking team have taken other roles within the company. A few number of individuals will be affected by the change but will be helping with the wind down of the program." Waymo's website has also been completely stripped of trucking mentions. The page for Waymo Via used to be at waymo.com/waymo-via but now 404s (archive here ), and the top-level navigation button for "Trucking" is gone.

    Waymo's focus on ride-hailing makes some sense. The reliability requirements for ride-hailing are much lower than trucking, making it a more lenient business. If you have a truck full of cargo, it's a major issue if something goes wrong and it can't reach its destination on time. The truck routes are many hours long over long distances and usually have some kind of delivery time attached. Your self-driving hardware and software has to work perfectly during all that. Ride-hailing is way easier. Trips are usually measured in minutes and in a localized area where you can easily dispatch support people if something goes wrong. Because the app is a central point of customer bookings, you can easily pause and resume accepting customers anytime. That makes it easy to shut down the fleet to deal with technical difficulties or bad weather. You can also rigidly control your service area and accept or decline trips on a whim. Everyone can just use Lyft instead.

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      California DMV gives Cruise and Waymo OK to charge for rides

      Jonathan M. Gitlin · news.movim.eu / ArsTechnica · Friday, 1 October, 2021 - 19:26

    A Cruise robotaxi test vehicle in San Francisco.

    Enlarge / A Cruise robotaxi test vehicle in San Francisco. (credit: Cruise)

    The autonomous vehicle developers Cruise and Waymo both got a little closer to running true driverless robotaxi services in and around San Francisco. In May, both Waymo and Cruise applied to the California Department of Motor Vehicles for deployment permits (as opposed to the testing permits that have allowed non-commercial operations). On Thursday, the DMV issued autonomous deployment permits to both companies, which is a necessary step if the robotaxis are to charge passengers for their rides.

    San Franciscans might have to be night owls to catch a Cruise; the DMV's authorization gives Cruise permission to operate on surface streets within a geofenced area of San Francisco between the hours of 10 pm and 6 am. Cruise's autonomous vehicles are allowed to operate in light rain and light fog, but they aren't allowed to exceed 30 mph (48 km/h).

    Waymo is allowed to operate over a wider area; the DMV's authorization is "within parts of San Francisco and San Mateo counties." These robotaxis are also trusted to cope with light rain and light fog and are approved for speeds of up to 65 mph (105 km/h).

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