Forbes – Waymo Launches Its Robotaxi Service In Los Angeles
See full original article by Alan Ohnsman at Forbes
The Alphabet unit’s expansion of its ride service beyond Phoenix and the San Francisco Bay Area comes amid a rocky period for developers of self-driving vehicle technology.
Waymo, Alphabet Inc.’s self-driving vehicle unit, is debuting its robotaxi service in Los Angeles this week, its third commercial market and a notable move given the problems and slow progress plaguing the autonomous driving space.
Starting March 14, the Waymo One service will be available to a limited number of commuters who have signed up to use it and will gradually expand to include people who download the company’s ride-hailing app. It will be free of charge initially, before transitioning to a paid service in a few weeks, the company said. Los Angeles is the Uber-like service’s third city, following Pheonix and San Francisco. Waymo is also planning to expand into Austin this year.
“Once an unimaginable future, autonomous driving is now a real-world way of getting around for tens of thousands of people each week,” Tekedra Mawakana, Waymo’s co-CEO, said in an emailed statement.
The move keeps Waymo, the oldest and best-funded autonomous driving company, as the de facto leader in a technology that’s proven far more difficult to master and deploy than anticipated a decade ago. Last year General Motors-backed Cruise, Waymo’s top rival, had to halt the operation of its entire fleet in San Francisco and laid off nearly a quarter of its staff when it lost its license to operate a robotaxi service in California after one of its vehicles hit and dragged a pedestrian who’d been struck moments earlier by another car. At the same time, once-promising companies hoping to deploy robotic semi trucks on U.S. highways, including TuSimple and Embark, have collapsed. Waymo also mothballed its autonomous trucking operations to focus solely on the robotaxi business.
In the wake of Cruise’s problems, California lawmakers have called for tougher rules on the technology including requirements that Waymo and other companies share more detailed safety data with the state and give cities the ability to control the issuing of permits to operate robotaxi services. Currently, that authority lies solely with a state agency.
Though Waymo has been earning fares from customers in Phoenix and San Francisco for a few years it’s never disclosed revenue from that business.
The company said the Los Angeles ride service will initially be available in a 63-square mile portion of the sprawling city, including such neighborhoods as Santa Monica, Beverly Hills, portions of Culver City, Koreatown and downtown L.A. It began mapping the city about five years ago and formally testing autonomous vehicles there in 2022.
The Los Angeles service will operate on city streets, though in January Waymo became the first robotaxi company to operate on highways, launching that option in Phoenix.
See full original article by Alan Ohnsman at Forbes
