Waymo
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Waymo formally applies for fully driverless car tests in California
Waymo has officially applied to the California DMV to test autonomous cars without drivers in the state. A source told the San Francisco Chronicle that the company will start trials around its Mountain View headquarters where it's been testing its self-driving Chrysler Pacific minivans, though those had personnel behind the wheel just in case. Eventually, they'll expand no-trial driving to more of the Bay Area, the source said.
Waymo may work with Honda on an autonomous delivery vehicle
Last week, Waymo announced a partnership to build autonomous Jaguar vehicles for its upcoming self-driving taxi service, which will augment its existing fleet of Chryslers. But today Bloomberg reported that the Alphabet company is nearing a deal with a third automaker, Honda, that may lead the pair to collaborate on an entirely new vehicle.
Waymo and Jaguar will test self-driving I-Pace SUVs later this year
Waymo is adding a luxury vehicle to its fleet of self-driving test vehicles, the upcoming I-Pace EV. At an event ahead of the New York Auto Show, the two companies announced that testing of the I-Pace outfitted with Waymo's autonomous technology will be on public roads later this year in Phoenix, Arizona.
Waymo will begin self-driving semi truck pilot in Atlanta next week
Today, Waymo, which is Alphabet's self-driving company, announced a pilot program located in Atlanta to further test its autonomous technology. This time, though, the focus is on semi trucks. Beginning next week, Waymo's self-driving trucks will begin hauling cargo to Google's data centers. There will, of course, be highly trained drivers in the cabs in case anything goes awry.
Uber considers Waymo partnership following lawsuit
Now that Waymo's long-running lawsuit against Uber is finally settled, the two companies are free to cozy up to a possible partnership. According to a report at The Information, Uber executives, led by new CEO Dara Khosrowshahi, have been looking for a way to get Uber riders into Waymo's autonomous cars.
Arizona no longer requires safety drivers in autonomous vehicles
Arizona will now allow self-driving cars to operate in the state without a safety driver behind the wheel. Governor Doug Ducey signed an executive order this week making it legal for these vehicles to operate on their own as long as they abide by all federal and state safety standards. "As technology advances, our policies and priorities must adapt to remain competitive in today's economy," Governor Ducey said in a statement. "This executive order embraces new technologies by creating an environment that supports autonomous vehicle innovation and maintains a focus on public safety."
Waymo's 360-degree demo ride shows what self-driving cars 'see'
One of the big steps necessary to roll out self-driving cars is getting the public to trust them, and Waymo's latest attempt to achieve that is with a new 360-degree experience. Viewable on a computer, your phone or a VR headset, it feeds a simulation of mixed video and sensor data (LiDAR, radar and cameras) from one of the company's Pacifica Hybrid minivans to give you a feeling of what it "sees" while driving along.
After Math: It's bobsled time!
The 2018 Winter Olympics are starting up but Pyeongchang won't be the only place crowning champions. This week we've already seen Waymo win out over Uber in court; Sasha 'Scarlett' Hostyn, the most successful woman in eSports, was victorious in an Olympic-backed Starcraft 2 tournament; and Amazon came up with yet another way to dominate the delivery market -- 2-hour Whole Foods deliveries. Numbers, because how else will you count the scorecards?
Recommended Reading: The excess of the Olympics
How the Olympics got Disneyfied Michael Weinreb, The Atlantic No matter which country hosts the Olympics, the Opening Ceremony is always jam-packed with over-the-top futuristic visuals and tons of culture. It's a display "financial and cultural excess," as The Atlantic's Michael Weinreb describes it, and it all got started in the US during the 1960 Winter Games in Squaw Valley.
Uber settles with Waymo over allegations of stolen trade secrets
The case between Uber and Waymo is over, and Uber is settling with Waymo over claims that the former stole trade secrets. The payout is a 0.34 percent equity stake in Uber to Waymo which totals around $245 million, according to CNBC. Waymo's accusation was that Uber stole trade secrets (some 14,000 files, allegedly) after engineer Anthony Levandowski left Uber to start Otto, the self-driving truck company that was then purchased by Uber in 2016 for $680 million.
After Math: The state of the 'uniom'
It was a week of taking stock as the President meandered his way through the State of the Union address and a number of tech firms reviewed their Q4 earnings. Alphabet and Amazon both had something to crow about, while Apple and GoPro both posted less than stellar holiday sales. Numbers, because how else would we realized that, at this point, the rules are made up and the points don't matter?
Waymo drove 2 million autonomous miles in 2017
Waymo's vehicles drove 2 million miles in self-driving mode across 25 cities in 2017, putting its total autonomous miles to 4 million. It accelerated its testing to prepare for its ride-hailing fleet's launch this year, allowing it to "gather as much data as possible in order to improve [its] technology." According to its annual report submitted to the government of California, Waymo drove 352,545 of those miles in The Golden State from December 2016 to November 2017. Within that period, the company reported a total of 63 disengagements (instances wherein the human test driver had to step in), which means its vehicles drove an average of 5,595 miles for every disengagement.
Waymo orders thousands of Chrysler vans for self-driving taxi service
Waymo already turned 600 Chrysler Pacifica minivans into self-driving vehicles, but apparently, those aren't enough for the company's upcoming taxi service. FCA US has revealed that it's supplying the former Google self-driving division with thousands of Chrysler Pacific minivans and that delivery will begin in late 2018. Waymo will use the vehicles it's already testing to launch its ride-hailing service in Phoenix this year -- the additional driverless minivans will be deployed to other cities when the service expands its reach.
Apple added two dozen self-driving SUVs to its California test fleet
Last April, Apple was granted a permit to test its autonomous vehicle technology by the state of California and since then, the company has expanded its test fleet from three vehicles to 27, Bloomberg reports. The California Department of Motor Vehicles said that Apple had registered 24 Lexus RX450h SUVs between last July and this month. While initially aiming to develop its own autonomous vehicle, Apple later decided to switch gears and design a self-driving system that could be incorporated into other vehicles. And we've seen glimpses of that technology in recent months. A patent application, a presentation from Apple AI Research Director Ruslan Salakhutdinov and a research paper have all pulled back parts of the curtain Apple's technology development usually hides behind. And a closeup look from Voyage cofounder MacCallister Higgins gave us a bit of a visual.
Waymo starts testing its autonomous cars in Atlanta
Waymo started offering free autonomous rides in Phoenix last April as a way to promote its self-driving cars. The Alphabet-owned company has been trying to ramp up its own ride-sharing service to compete with Uber and Lyft, offering a driverless taxi service Waymo hopes to use in covering a region larger than London. Now, Waymo is expanding beyond Arizona, launching a test program set to launch in Atlanta, Georgia.
Levandowski faces fresh accusations of stealing trade secrets
The Waymo v. Uber trial is set to finally get started next month, but Anthony Levandowski, the man who has been accused of taking 14,000 files from Google's self-driving outfit when he left the company for his own startup Otto, has been hit with a lawsuit that may affect Waymo's. Wired reports that Levandowski's former nanny, Erika Wong, has filed a suit against him claiming Levandowski failed to pay her wages, violated labor and health codes and inflicted emotional distress. But the complaint also includes details of Levandowski's business practices, which suggest that he might have been paying off employees of other autonomous vehicle companies and that he considered fleeing to Canada when Waymo first filed its lawsuit.
Waymo starts testing self-driving minivans in San Francisco
Waymo's self-driving minivans are now ready for the road. The company has confirmed to TechCrunch that it's testing its autonomous Chrysler Pacifica vehicles on San Francisco streets, where the "hilly and foggy" environment should give them "even more practice." Suffice it to say the densely packed city could provide a greater challenge than Chandler, Arizona, whose spacious suburban landscape is well-suited to driverless car experiments.
Waymo preps for self-driving taxi service with rider insurance deal
Waymo faces a slew of challenges if it's going to get its autonomous taxi service up and running, not the least of which is insurance. Who's going to cover passengers when there's no human pilot to help determine who's responsible? Thankfully, someone has stepped up to the plate. Waymo has struck a deal with insurance tech startup Trov to protect passengers when the service goes live in Phoenix in 2018. Trov has adapted its on-demand insurance to be triggered by software instead of a human, giving you automatic coverage during your trip without having to pay extra or even acknowledge that the policy is taking effect.
'Jacobs letter' unsealed, accuses Uber of spying, hacking
Waymo's lawsuit against Uber for allegedly stealing technology for self-driving cars hasn't gone to trial yet, because the judge received a letter from the Department of Justice suggesting Uber withheld crucial evidence. That letter, with some redactions, is now available for all to read and it's not good news for Uber. It was written by the attorney of a former employee, Richard Jacobs, and it contains claims that the company routinely tried to hack its competitors to gain an edge, used a team of spies to steal secrets or surveil political figures and even bugged meetings between transport regulators -- with some of this information delivered directly to former CEO Travis Kalanick.
DOJ confirms criminal investigation into Uber vs. Waymo
The civil trial between Uber and Waymo over stolen self-driving technology was supposed to start December 4th, but Judge Alsup announced a delay last month. Now he has unsealed the letter (over objections from the US Attorney's Office in San Francisco) from the Department of Justice that caused the delay. It not only confirms that there is a criminal investigation into Uber's behavior, it reveals a former employee's claim that the company intentionally used "non-attributable electronic devices" (read: burner phones and the like) to conceal use of any stolen technology. In the letter, it also says that the former employee, Richard Jacobs, described a "hypothetical" where two CEOs could meet covertly for a long period of time prior to an acquisition. Two CEOs, like, say, Anthony Levandowski of Otto and Travis Kalanick of Uber.
