Half of Uber’s riders say no to self-driving cars – highlighting trust issues

Uber reports that half its riders in areas where it offers autonomous rides say “no, thank you” to the offer.

It highlights trust issues with self-driving technologies.

Uber was an early player in self-driving vehicles. it makes sense since the technology stands to disrupt its business more than any other.

However, its own effort didn’t go too well.

Now, Uber works with other companies, like Waymo, to deploy autonomous vehicles into its fleet in some markets.

In a new interview with Bloomberg, Uber Dara Khosrowshahi CEO says that only about half of the riders agree to be driven with

“The most important factor is, ‘Can we make this technology safe? Can we build trust for riders, for example, in markets where we offer autonomous, half of our riders say, no thank you?.”

While autonomous rides are technically already here thanks to Waymo, Khosrowshahi believes that there’s still a lot of work to be done.

He sees the next few years being focused on safety before moving to economics:

“Safety is job number one. We will then, I would say in the next three to seven years, start to focus on economics.” 

He added:

“While the margins on autonomous will be lower than non-autonomous in the early years, we think long-term, it can be great for business and it can be great for society.” 

Uber is betting on a mix of autonomous and non-autonomous rides for years to come as consumers build confidence in the self-driving system as the safety improves.

Electrek’s Take

Uber is playing some damage control here as Tesla CEO Elon Musk and his legions of fans have been pushing a “winner-take-all” mentality when it comes to self-driving. It has been putting pressure on Uber’s business.

With its autonomy event today, they believe Tesla is on the verge of deploying a self-driving system that will take over the transportation industry.

The reality is much more complicated.

Uber has actually great insight into the technology as it partnered with virtually every major player, including Waymo, GM’s Cruise, and China’s WeRide.

They are correct about the fact that there’s still a lot of convincing to be done for self-driving to become mainstream. Many people don’t believe it or don’t trust the technology to drive them around – and for good reasons, in some cases.

As for the economics, I think that’s where Tesla has an advantage over Waymo and other players with its technology having already been scaled into millions of vehicles. But there’s a big caveat: proving that it can actually work without supervision, which Tesla is still far from achieving.

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