Waymo made great strides throughout 2017 that culminated with the announcement that a public ride service is coming soon to Phoenix. Now, Alphabet’s self-driving division is returning to San Francisco to test its autonomous Chrysler Pacifica vehicles.
According to a report out of The Wall Street Journal today, customers of Waymo’s ride hailing service will be covered for any damaged property and trip-related medical expenses (hopefully none!) by a relatively new insurance startup out of Danville, California.
The Waymo case against Uber was due to begin in October, but was delayed to give the Alphabet division more time to examine last-minute evidence. Rescheduled to begin next week, the trial has again been postponed after information and other bombshell allegations that Uber withheld have surfaced.
Back in May, Alphabet’s Waymo announced that its autonomous vehicles have driven three million miles on public roads since the program’s inception in 2009. Six months later, that total has increased to four million miles.
Following eight years of development and a recent public awareness campaign, Waymo’s self-driving cars are now transporting passengers without a human behind the wheel. These fully autonomous rides started in mid-October and in the coming months will expand to the public as part of a ride-hailing service.
Alphabet’s Waymo announced today it is expanding its self-driving vehicle test program to Michigan in order to test in tougher winter conditions.
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Waymo’s lawsuit against Uber was surprising on a number of fronts, including Google and Alphabet’s normal hesitancy towards suits. However, as it stated, Waymo found Uber’s actions a particularly large affront. Reuters has now discovered what Waymo is demanding from Uber in settlement talks to stop the case from going to trial.
With Waymo rumored to launch a ride-hailing service in the coming months, the Alphabet division is launching a public education campaign about self-driving cars. First rolling out in Arizona, Waymo wants to inform the world about the advantages of autonomous vehicles.
Late last year, Waymo unveiled a self-driving Chrysler Pacifica hybrid minivan as its main autonomous vehicle. Besides working with Fiat Chrysler on the car, Waymo also worked with Intel on various components, which was revealed today by the chip maker as part of a collaboration on self-driving technology.
Lawsuits are always fascinating in what information gets brought to light as part of the proceedings, and Google’s are no different. One inadvertent slip-up has revealed that Google spent $1.1 billion developing its autonomous technology from 2009 to 2015.
Back in June, Waymo was rumored to be working on self-driving semi trucks, with images of such a vehicle emerging later that month. Meanwhile, the Alphabet division also began exploring a ride-sharing service in Phoenix this year.
During an interview today, CEO John Krafcik confirmed Waymo’s work on both and how their autonomous technology might first come to market through either of those uses.
As the ongoing Waymo vs Uber legal saga nears next month’s trial, the Alphabet subsidiary has been granted access (via Gizmodo) to a key document related to the acquisition of Anthony Levandowski’s Otto startup. This due diligence report, which has been closely guarded, takes a look at the Googlers that eventually ended up at Uber.
While real-world experience is important for training self-driving cars, virtual driving is increasingly playing a bigger and bigger role for Alphabet’s autonomous vehicle division. This Carcraft virtualization works in tandem with a “secret base” known as Castle where Waymo has built a city that can quickly be reconfigured to different testing scenarios.
Last month, Uber was granted the ability to depose Alphabet CEO Larry Page as part of the ongoing Waymo suit. Following the release of a redacted transcript of the questioning today, Uber has asked a judge for more deposition time. At issue is the apparent lack of preparation on the part of Page with many “I don’t recall” answers.
The latest twist and turn in the Waymo v. Uber suit sees the Alphabet division allege that an Uber law firm helped hide stolen information related to the acquisition of Anthony Levandowski’s self-driving start-up. As the suit heads closer to trial in October, former Uber CEO Travis Kalanick has just hired a former U.S. attorney to represent him.
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…
This past Friday saw a flurry of developments in Waymo’s case against Uber, including the Alphabet company toning down its patent infringement claims to focus on trade secret theft. As part of the upcoming October trial, a magistrate judge has granted Uber the ability to depose Larry Page.
At the insistence of the presiding U.S. District Judge, Waymo has reduced the number of patent-infringement claims it is waging against Uber to all but one. Rather, the Alphabet division (via Bloomberg) will be focusing on the theft of trade secrets in its upcoming trial.
Uber revealed today that some of its executives, including CEO Travis Kalanick, were aware that ex-Google engineer Anthony Levandowski possessed data from his previous employer. However, the ride-sharing service claims that at the time it did know about the proprietary nature of the data. Uber further argues that its former self-driving lead only took the information due to a bonus dispute with Google.
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.
Back in April, Waymo expanded its trial of self-driving Chrysler Pacificas to all residents of Phoenix, Arizona. With 100 cars already in the fleet, it also announced 500 additional minivans for the public test. The Alphabet company has today revealed an agreement that will see Avis Car Rental managing those autonomous vehicles.
According to new court documents, Uber’s now ex-CEO Travis Kalanick was aware that the ex-Googler Anthony Levandowski, then at his newly-founded startup Otto, had “discs” containing Google documents as far back as March 2016. Kalanick reportedly “conveyed” to Levandowski that he “should not bring any Google information into Uber.”
According to a new report from BuzzFeed News, Alphabet’s Waymo self-driving car company is exploring self-driving trucking. The report explains that the efforts are currently in their early stages, though the company has confirmed that it is testing self-driving trucks…
Anthony Levandowski, the former Google engineer at the center of Waymo and Uber’s legal battle, has been fired. This termination comes due to his continued refusal to cooperate in proceedings over whether the ride-sharing service stole Alphabet’s self-driving technology.
