Waymo

The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has officially changed a long-standing rule that is now creating a path for automakers to deliver self-driving vehicles without steering wheels or pedals.

You know Geely as the Chinese money behind Volvo, Polestar, and Lotus – but they’re a lot bigger than that. Geely has its own brand, is backing an electric Smart revival, and recently invested billions in Mercedes’ parent company, Daimler, to become a top shareholder. Geely means business, in other words, and the CEO of their newest premium EV brand, Zeekr, has eyes on America.

Autonomous rideshare startup Waymo has announced an additional $2.5 billion investment round of funding. Waymo plans to use the additional funding, led by parent company Alphabet Inc., to hire more staff and advance its self-driving technology toward more paid rides.

In a Tweet earlier today, autonomous rideshare company Cruise, announced it has secured a multi-year credit line of $5 billion from GM financial, to help purchase thousands of Origin vehicles. This new credit line will give Cruise $10 billion in total capital to help roll out its autonomous Origin vehicles manufactured by GM.

Autonomous rideshare rivals Waymo and Cruise have both reportedly applied for permits to charge passengers for self-driving rides in the San Francisco Bay area. Some of the applications are still under review, but it could be a major step toward autonomous rideshare vehicles operating as commonplace soon.

Tesla and Waymo took to media and social media to spar over who has the best self-driving technology.

Waymo is throwing shade at Tesla and Elon Musk over comments that the latter has made about the usefulness of the former’s self-driving technology.

Waymo and Daimler have announced a new partnership to bring the former’s autonomous driving technology to the latter’s semi trucks.

Waymo and Volvo this week announced an exclusive partnership to build a new self-driving electric vehicle for use in a ride-hailing service. Few details were provided other than the goal of working together to develop a Level 4 vehicle capable of autonomy in a wide range of locations and road conditions.

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Waymo has been working with a group of early riders in its test program in the Phoenix metro area for over a year and it is learning how they use their autonomous ride-hailing service.

Building on what they learned, Waymo is now announcing new partnerships to help riders better make use of their autonomous service, including a partnership with Walmart. Expand
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After ordering thousands of Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid minivans in January, Waymo is drastically expanding its self-driving fleet with an 62,000 more vehicles. It comes ahead of the Alphabet division’s first ride service this year, while the company is also in discussions to allow others to sell cars that feature its autonomous technology.

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Waymo unveiled its latest vehicle equipped with its self-driving technology: a self-driving and all-electric Jaguar I-Pace.

They are building a fleet of those new vehicles to add to their existing test fleets and their upcoming commercial services, which is expected to launch later this year starting in Phoenix. Expand
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Waymo, Alphabet’s self-driving company born out of Google X, is seen by many as the leader in the field of self-driving.

After focusing on autonomous passenger cars to soon launch a self-driving ride-hailing service, the company is now expanding the effort to trucks.  Expand
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Outside of the tech community, self-driving technology is still seeing a lot of pushback from people who don’t trust computers driving a car for them.

A new video released by Alphabet’s Waymo does a great job to familiarize people with the technology. Expand
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It can be hard to get your hands on a Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid, the only plug-in minivan for sale in the US today, and now availability could get worse.

Waymo, Alphabet’s self-driving car company that spun out of Google X, announced that it is adding ‘thousands’ of Pacifica plug-in hybrid vans to its self-driving fleet. Expand
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Following eight years of development and an ongoing public awareness campaign, Waymo’s self-driving cars are now transporting passengers without a human behind the wheel. Beginning mid-October, these fully autonomous rides will expand to the public as part of a ride-hailing service in the coming months.

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Alphabet’s Waymo announced today that they are expanding their self-driving vehicle test program to Michigan in order to test in tougher winter conditions. Expand
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Waymo’s lawsuit against Uber this February was surprising given Google and Alphabet’s usual hesitancy towards suing. However, Waymo found Uber’s alleged actions a particularly large affront. Reuters has now discovered what Waymo demanded from Uber in settlement talks to stop the case from heading to trial.

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Waymo, Alphabet’s self-driving car company, has been test-driving its custom Chrysler Pacifica minivans in Phoenix, Arizona for the last couple of months. This public-facing testing is to help teach Waymo’s cars and minivans how to drive independently on public streets. Now, the company has been working with a local police and fire department to train the self-driving minivans to better recognize and react to emergency vehicles…

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A report out of BuzzFeed News at the beginning of this month said that Alphabet’s Waymo was in the early stages of exploring self-driving trucks, and now (via Jalopnik) we have our first peek at one of those trucks out on public roads. The truck sports an appropriate light blue color, the Waymo insignia, and of course the self-driving hardware suite.

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