Tag: self-driving cars

Cruise, GM’s robotaxi service, suspends all driverless operations nationwide

NEW YORK — Cruise, the autonomous vehicle unit owned by General Motors, is suspending driverless operations nationwide days after regulators in California found that its driverless cars posed a danger to public safety.

The California Department of Motor Vehicles this week revoked the license for Cruise, which recently began transporting passengers throughout San Francisco.

Cruise is also being investigated by U.S. regulators after receiving reports of potential risks to pedestrians and passengers.

“We have decided to proactively pause driverless operations across all of our fleets while we take time to examine our processes, systems, and tools and reflect on how we can better operate in a way that will earn public trust,” Cruise wrote on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, Thursday night.

The choice to suspend its driverless services isn’t related to any new on-road incidents, Cruise added. Human-supervised operations of Cruise’s autonomous vehicles, or AVs, will continue — including under California’s indefinite suspension.

General Motors Co., which has ambitious goals for Cruise, has taken a significant hit this week. The Detroit automaker had been expecting annual revenue of $1 billion from Cruise by 2025 — a big jump from the $106 million in revenue last year.

Cruise has also tested a robotaxi service in Los Angeles, as well as cities like Phoenix and Austin, Texas.

While the California Department of Motor Vehicles didn’t elaborate on specific reasons for its suspension of Cruise’s license this week, the agency charged Cruise with misrepresenting safety information about the autonomous technology in its vehicles. Tuesday’s revocation followed a series of incidents that heightened concerns about the hazards and inconveniences caused by Cruise’s robotaxis.

Earlier this month, a Cruise robotaxi notably ran over a pedestrian who had been hit by another vehicle driven by a human. The pedestrian became pinned under a tire of the Cruise vehicle after it came to a stop — and then was pulled for about 20 feet (six meters) as the car attempted to move off the road.

The DMV and others have accused Cruise of not initially sharing all video footage of the accident, but the robotaxi operator pushed back — saying it disclosed the full video to state and federal officials. In a Tuesday statement, Cruise said it cooperating with regulators investigating the Oct. 2 accident — and that its engineers are working on way for its robotaxis to improve their response “to this kind of extremely rare event.”

Still, some are skeptical of Cruise’s response to the accident and point to lingering questions. Bryant Walker Smith, a University of South Carolina law professor who studies automated vehicles, wants to know “who knew what when?” at Cruise, and maybe GM, following the accident.

Also earlier this month, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced that it was investigating Cruise’s autonomous vehicle division after receiving reports of incidents where vehicles may not have used proper caution around pedestrians in roadways, including crosswalks.

The NHTSA’s Office of Defects Investigation said it received two reports involving pedestrian injuries from Cruise vehicles. It also identified two additional incidents from videos posted to public websites, noting that the total number is unknown.

In December of last year, the NHSTA opened a separate probe into reports of Cruise’s robotaxis that stopped too quickly or unexpectedly quit moving, potentially stranding passengers. Three rear-end collisions that reportedly took place after Cruise AVs braked hard kicked off the investigation.

According to an Oct. 20 letter that was made public Thursday, since beginning this probe the NHSTA has received five other reports of Cruise AVs unexpectedly breaking with no obstacles ahead. Each case involved AVs operating without human supervision and resulted in rear-end collisions.

“We welcome NHTSA’s questions related to our safety record and operations,” Cruise spokesperson Hannah Lindow said in a statement Friday. “We have cooperated with each of their requests to date as part of the ongoing investigation process and will continue doing so.”

Cruise has also previously maintained that its record of driverless miles have outperformed comparable human drivers in terms of safety, notably crash rates.

It’s unclear what this week’s suspension of driverless operations will mean for Cruise, and perhaps the future for AVs as a whole. Walker Smith notes that there are several possibilities — including distinguishing Cruise’s prospects from its competitors, particularly those who haven’t expanded as aggressively, or a “Tesla scenario” where initial outrage may not amount to prompt, significant changes.

There could also be larger repercussions for the industry — with this month’s news feeding into “the emerging narrative that automated vehicles and their companies are struggling and failing,” he said. “Cities like San Francisco, that are already concerned about automated vehicles, (may) see and use this as as proof that that the industry is running amok.”

That doesn’t mean Cruise won’t resume its driverless operations again one day. But it will boil down to what additional information comes out down the road — as well as Cruise identifying specific action items in the near future, Walker Smith added.

“If we can’t trust a company deploying automated vehicles, they have no business on our roads,” Walker Smith said. He later noted that Cruise’s announcement Thursday “expressly referenced earning trust, and I think they need to say what that means.”

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AP Technology Writer Michael Liedtke in San Francisco contributed to this report.

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October 27, 2023
GM self-driving car subsidiary withheld video of a crash, California DMV says | CNN Business

CNN
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The California Department of Motor Vehicles Tuesday revoked Cruise’s permits to test and operate fully driverless vehicles on the state’s roads. The California DMV said, in part, it was because Cruise, which is GM’s self-driving vehicle technology subsidiary, withheld video and information about a crash involving a pedestrian.

The suspension applies only to vehicles with no “safety driver,” meaning there is no one in the driver’s seat ready to take over the controls if needed.

The agency also indicated that Cruise had “misrepresented… information related to safety of the autonomous technology of its vehicles.”

For those reasons, the California DMV wrote, it was necessary to revoke the company’s permits. The DMV notice did not specify exactly what incidents or communications from Cruise led to the suspensions.

About three weeks ago, a Cruise vehicle hit a pedestrian in downtown San Francisco who had first been hit by another vehicle then and was propelled by this collision into the path of the Cruise driverless car. After striking the pedestrian a second time, the Cruise vehicle, attempting to pull off the road and out of the way of traffic, dragged the pedestrian along the road for 20 feet at a speed at about seven miles an hour, according to the DMV’s report.

“Our thoughts continue to be with the victim as we hope for a rapid and complete recovery,” Cruise wrote in an emailed statement. A San Francisco Fire Department spokesperson said at the time that victim had multiple serious injuries.

Cruise claims that it proactively reached out both state and federal safety regulators following that incident. Regulators at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration opened an investigation into the safety of Cruise autonomous vehicles around pedestrians.

The DMV alleges that Cruise did not tell regulators that the car dragged the pedestrian across the roadway while attempting to pull over following the impact. Also, the DMV’s order of suspensions indicates that the video Cruise provided of the incident, taken by the self-driving car’s on-board cameras, stopped shortly after the car hit the pedestrian and did not show the dragging. Cruise did not provide a longer video showing the entire incident until 10 days later, after DMV had learned of the pedestrian being dragged “from another government agency.”

A video of the incident shown to a CNN reporter shortly after it occurred also did not show the pedestrian being dragged.

In a statement shared with CNN on Wednesday, Cruise denied that it had withheld any video from the DMV and said that it shared a full video with the agency when the incident was first reported.

“The DMV has provided Cruise with the steps needed to apply to reinstate its suspended permits, which the DMV will not approve until the company has fulfilled the requirements to the department’s satisfaction,” the agency sad in the notice posted to its web site.

This summer, Cruise and Waymo, the driverless car arm of Google-parent Alphabet received permission from San Francisco regulators to begin regular paid driverless taxi services in that city.

Cruise will continue operations of its driverless fleets in Phoenix, Arizona and Austin, Texas.

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October 27, 2023
California regulators suspend San Francisco robotaxi service for safety reasons

California regulators have revoked the license of a robotaxi service owned by General Motors after determining its driverless cars that recently began transporting passengers throughout San Francisco are a dangerous menace

ByMICHAEL LIEDTKE AP technology writer

October 24, 2023, 2:43 PM

FILE – Associated Press reporter Michael Liedtke sits in the back of a Cruise driverless taxi that picked him up in San Francisco’s Mission District, Feb. 15, 2023. California’s Department of Motor Vehicles on Tuesday, Oct. 24, immediately suspended operation of Cruise’s driverless robotaxis in San Francisco, citing public safety after one of its cars ran over a person fatally struck by a vehicle driven by a human. (AP Photo/Terry Chea, File)

The Associated Press

SAN FRANCISCO — California regulators have revoked the license of a robotaxi service owned by General Motors after determining its driverless cars that recently began transporting passengers throughout San Francisco are a dangerous menace.

The California Department of Motor Vehicles’ indefinite suspension of the Cruise robotaxi service comes just two months after another state regulator, the Public Utilities Commission, approved an expansion that authorized around-the-clock rides throughout San Francisco — the second most dense city in the U.S.

That approval came over a chorus of protests, including some lodged by police and fire officials who asserted the driverless vehicles had been impeding traffic in emergencies during a testing phase.

Now Cruise is being forced to slam on the brakes on its operations after the DMV concluded its robotaxis posed “an unreasonable risk to public safety,” according to a statement issued by the agency.

The DMV didn’t elaborate on the specific reasons for the suspension, but the move comes after a series of incidents that heightened concerns about the hazards and inconveniences caused by Cruise’s robotaxis. The worries reached a new level earlier this month after a Cruise robotaxi ran over a pedestrian who had been hit by another vehicle driven by a human, and then pinned the pedestrian under one of its tires after coming to a stop.

In a statement, Cruise confirmed it has ceased its robotaxi operations in San Francisco. It said it is continuing to cooperate with state and federal regulators in their inquiry into the Oct. 2 accident involving a robotaxi named “Panini” and the critically injured pedestrian, who had to be extracted from under the robotaxi with the help of the “jaws of life” before being taken to a local hospital. Cruise said its engineers are examining that accident and working on way for its robotaxis to improve their response “to this kind of extremely rare event.”

While Cruise has been sidelined in San Francisco, another robotaxi operated by Waymo is continuing to give rides throughout the city. Waymo, which began as as secret project within Google more than a decade ago, has been running another robotaxi service in Phoenix for the past three years.

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October 24, 2023
California bill to have human drivers ride in autonomous trucks is vetoed by governor

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California Gov. Gavin Newsom has vetoed a bill to require human drivers on board self-driving trucks, a measure that union leaders and truck drivers said would save hundreds of thousands of jobs in the state.

The legislation vetoed Friday night would have banned self-driving trucks weighing more than 10,000 pounds (4,536 kilograms) — ranging from UPS delivery vans to massive big rigs — from operating on public roads unless a human driver is on board.

Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher, head of the California Labor Federation, said driverless trucks are dangerous and called Newsom’s veto shocking. She estimates that removing drivers would cost a quarter million jobs in the state.

“We will not sit by as bureaucrats side with tech companies, trading our safety and jobs for increased corporate profits. We will continue to fight to make sure that robots do not replace human drivers and that technology is not used to destroy good jobs,” Fletcher said in a statement late Friday.

In a statement announcing that he would not sign the bill, the Democratic governor said additional regulation of autonomous trucks was unnecessary because existing laws are sufficient.

Newsom pointed to 2012 legislation that allows the state Department of Motor Vehicles to work with the California Highway Patrol, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration “and others with relevant expertise to determine the regulations necessary for the safe operation of autonomous vehicles on public roads.”

Opponents of the bill argued self-driving cars that are already on the roads haven’t caused many serious accidents compared to cars driven by people. Businesses say self-driving trucks would help them transport products more efficiently.

Union leaders and drivers said the bill would have helped address concerns about safety and losing truck driving jobs to automation in the future.

The bill coasted through the Legislature with few lawmakers voting against it. It’s part of ongoing debates about the potential risks of self-driving vehicles and how workforces adapt to a new era as companies deploy technologies to do work traditionally done by humans.

Newsom, who typically enjoys strong support from labor, faced some pressure from within his administration not to sign it. His administration’s Office of Business and Economic Development says it would push companies making self-driving technologies to move out-of-state.

The veto comes as the debate over the future of autonomous vehicles heats up. In San Francisco, two robotaxi companies got approval last month from state regulators to operate in the city at all hours.

Last Tuesday in Sacramento, hundreds of truck drivers, union leaders and other supporters of the bill rallied at the state Capitol. Drivers chanted “sign that bill” as semi-trucks lined a street in front of the Capitol. There are about 200,000 commercial truck drivers in California, according to Teamsters officials.

Also Friday, Newsom vetoed a bill that would have required judges in custody cases to consider whether a parent affirms their child’s gender identity and another measure that would have barred state prison officials from sharing information about incarcerated immigrants with federal officials.

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September 23, 2023
California bill to have human drivers ride in autonomous trucks is vetoed by governor

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California Gov. Gavin Newsom has vetoed a bill to require human drivers on board self-driving trucks, a measure that union leaders and truck drivers said would save hundreds of thousands of jobs in the state.

The legislation vetoed Friday night would have banned self-driving trucks weighing more than 10,000 pounds (4,536 kilograms) — ranging from UPS delivery vans to massive big rigs — from operating on public roads unless a human driver is on board.

Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher, head of the California Labor Federation, said driverless trucks are dangerous and called Newsom’s veto shocking. She estimates that removing drivers would cost a quarter million jobs in the state.

“We will not sit by as bureaucrats side with tech companies, trading our safety and jobs for increased corporate profits. We will continue to fight to make sure that robots do not replace human drivers and that technology is not used to destroy good jobs,” Fletcher said in a statement late Friday.

In a statement announcing that he would not sign the bill, the Democratic governor said additional regulation of autonomous trucks was unnecessary because existing laws are sufficient.

Newsom pointed to 2012 legislation that allows the state Department of Motor Vehicles to work with the California Highway Patrol, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration “and others with relevant expertise to determine the regulations necessary for the safe operation of autonomous vehicles on public roads.”

Opponents of the bill argued self-driving cars that are already on the roads haven’t caused many serious accidents compared to cars driven by people. Businesses say self-driving trucks would help them transport products more efficiently.

Union leaders and drivers said the bill would have helped address concerns about safety and losing truck driving jobs to automation in the future.

The bill coasted through the Legislature with few lawmakers voting against it. It’s part of ongoing debates about the potential risks of self-driving vehicles and how workforces adapt to a new era as companies deploy technologies to do work traditionally done by humans.

Newsom, who typically enjoys strong support from labor, faced some pressure from within his administration not to sign it. His administration’s Office of Business and Economic Development says it would push companies making self-driving technologies to move out-of-state.

The veto comes as the debate over the future of autonomous vehicles heats up. In San Francisco, two robotaxi companies got approval last month from state regulators to operate in the city at all hours.

Last Tuesday in Sacramento, hundreds of truck drivers, union leaders and other supporters of the bill rallied at the state Capitol. Drivers chanted “sign that bill” as semi-trucks lined a street in front of the Capitol. There are about 200,000 commercial truck drivers in California, according to Teamsters officials.

Also Friday, Newsom vetoed a bill that would have required judges in custody cases to consider whether a parent affirms their child’s gender identity and another measure that would have barred state prison officials from sharing information about incarcerated immigrants with federal officials.

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September 23, 2023
Dubai to start robotaxi trials next month in major autonomous push | CNN Business

Editor’s Note: A version of this story appears in CNN’s Meanwhile in the Middle East newsletter, a three-times-a-week look inside the region’s biggest stories. Sign up here.

Abu Dhabi, UAE
CNN
—

Dubai is rolling out its first round of robotaxis next month, as a part of a plan to alleviate congestion and accidents.

Five fully autonomous electric taxis, operated by a General Motors subsidiary called Cruise, will begin test driving on an 8km (5 mile) stretch in the upscale Jumeirah district of the United Arab Emirates city, according to Ahmed Bahrozyan, the CEO of Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority (RTA).

Dubai hopes to become the first Middle Eastern city to introduce driverless taxis, Bahrozyan said. Autonomous taxis currently operate in several cities around the world, mostly in the US and China.

Cruise operates commercial robotaxis in US cities like San Francisco, but Dubai would be the first launch of the cars outside the US, Bahrozyan said.

“We are doing our own set of tests and trials in Dubai… every city has its own characteristics,” Bahrozyan said in an interview with CNN. “We have weather conditions that are certainly different than the US.”

RTA plans to roll out 4,000 self-driving taxis by 2030, adding to the fleet of 12,000 traditional taxis in the city. Rides are expected to be slightly more expensive than an ordinary taxi but in the same price range as a private car like Uber.

Cruise entered a contract with the RTA for 15 years, and after this period the taxi market may open up to competitors. Bahroyzyan said he foresees autonomous vehicles eventually making up the majority of the Middle East tourist hub’s taxi fleet.

A year after GM’s Cruise robotaxis were launched in California, the company was forced to cut its fleet in half in the state following a series of collisions. The collisions outlined the potential challenges of driverless cars.

Bahroyzyan said there will be “zero compromise on safety.”

Dubai issued a law in April to regulate autonomous vehicles, setting benchmarks for technical, operational and safety aspects of cars. Selling and buying autonomous cars was also regulated.

WeRide, a Chinese autonomous car technology company began trialing robotaxis in the UAE’s capital, Abu Dhabi, in 2022.

In July, the UAE granted WeRide a license to trial all its vehicles, from robobuses to robosweepers, but the company began testing certain routes a year prior.

The Middle East is a “key focus area” for driverless cars and WeRide said it hopes to deepen its presence in the region. WeRide also has a collaboration with the Saudi Artificial Intelligence Company to develop a robobus route.

Saudi’s Transport General Authority introduced self-driving buses during the 2023 Hajj season in July, shuttling pilgrims in Mecca, according to local media.

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August 2, 2023
Regulators give green light to driverless taxis in San Francisco | CNN Business

CNN
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California regulators gave approval Thursday to two rival robotaxi companies, Cruise and Waymo, to operate their driverless cars 24/7 across all of San Francisco and charge passengers for their services.

The much-anticipated vote, which followed roughly six hours of public comment both for and against driverless taxis, came amid clashes between the robotaxi companies and some residents of the hilly city. San Francisco first responders, city transportation leaders and local activists are among those who shared concerns about the technology.

The California Public Utilities Commission regulates self-driving cars in the state and voted 3-to-1 in favor of Waymo and Cruise expanding their operations.

That means residents and visitors to San Francisco will be able to pay a fare to ride in a driverless taxi, ushering in new automated competition to cab and ridehail drivers.

“Today’s permit marks the true beginning of our commercial operations in San Francisco,” said Tekedra Mawakana, co-CEO of Waymo, in a press release.

Cruise spokesperson Drew Pusateri said in a statement to CNN that the 24/7 driverless service is a “historic industry milestone” that puts Cruise “in a position to compete with traditional ridehail, and challenge an unsafe, inaccessible transportation status quo.”

Until Thursday’s vote, Cruise and Waymo could offer only limited service to San Francisco residents.

Cruise – a subsidiary of General Motors – could charge a fare only for overnight rides occurring between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. in select parts of the city. Waymo, owned by Google’s parent company Alphabet, could charge a fare only for rides with a human driver in the vehicle.

Now, Cruise and Waymo can charge a fare for their driverless rides and 24/7 access to San Francisco streets as they do so.

Cruise officials told state commissioners at a recent public hearing that it deploys about 300 vehicles at night and 100 during the day, while Waymo officials said that around 100 of its 250 vehicles are on the road at any given time.

The autonomous ride-hailing service offered by Cruise and Waymo allows users to request a ride similar to Uber or Lyft. There is a difference, of course: The car has no driver.

Members of the public packed the commission’s San Francisco headquarters to share their thoughts with state commissioners in one-minute increments during the meeting. Critics pointed to driverless cars freezing in traffic and blocking first responders, while advocates said they felt the cars drove more defensively than human drivers.

Although the decision ultimately laid in the hands of state regulators, who delayed the vote twice, local officials also expressed their dissent.

The San Francisco Police Officers Association, San Francisco Deputy Sheriffs’ Association and the San Francisco Fire Fighters Local 798 all wrote letters to the CPUC in the week leading up to the originally scheduled vote on June 29. Each expressed concerns that autonomous vehicles could impede emergency responders.

“The time that it takes for an officer or any other public safety employee to try and interact with an autonomous vehicle is frustrating in the best-case scenario, but when they can not comprehend our demands to move to the side of the roadway and are stopped in the middle of the roadway blocking emergency response units, then it rises to another level of danger,” wrote Tracy McCray, president of the San Francisco Police Officers Association in June, “and that is unacceptable.”

The San Francisco Fire Department has recorded 55 incidents of driverless vehicles interfering with their emergency responses in 2023 as of Wednesday, the department confirmed to CNN.

In one incident reported by the department on Saturday, a Waymo car pulled up between a car on fire and the fire truck aiming to put it out.

Other instances include robotaxis driving through yellow tape into the scene of a shooting, blocking firehouse driveways such that a fire truck farther away had to respond to the scene, and requiring firefighters to reroute, according to Fire Chief Jeanine Nicholson.

“It should not be up to my people to have to move their vehicle out of the way when we’re responding to one of our 160,000 calls,” Nicholson told CNN in June.

Robotaxi companies have often touted their safety records. Out of 3 million driverless miles, a Cruise car has not been involved in a single fatality or life-threatening injury, according to the company. In a February review of its first million driverless miles, Waymo said their cars caused no reported injuries and that 55% of all contact events were the result of a human driver hitting a stationary Waymo vehicle.

2022 was the worst year on record for traffic fatalities in San Francisco since 2014, according to city data. Cruise said that when benchmarked against human drivers in comparable driving environments, its vehicles were involved in 54% fewer collisions overall.

The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency said in a California Public Utilities Commission meeting on Monday that it had logged almost 600 incidents involving autonomous vehicles since the technology first launched in San Francisco. The agency said they believe this is “a fraction” of actual incidents due to what they allege is a lack of data transparency.

Genevieve Shiroma, the dissenting commissioner in the 3-1 vote, recommended the commission delay the vote until they received a “better understanding of the safety impacts” of the vehicles.

“First responders should not be prevented from doing their job. The fact that an injury or fatality has not occurred yet is not the end of the inquiry,” Shiroma said. “The commission needs a better explanation regarding why these events occur.”

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August 2, 2023
GM’s Cruise slashed fleet of robotaxis by 50% in San Francisco after collisions | CNN Business

CNN
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California authorities have asked General Motors to “immediately” take some of its Cruse robotaxis off the road after autonomous vehicles were involved in two collisions – including one with an active fire truck – last week in San Francisco.

California’s Department of Motor Vehicles confirmed to CNN that it is investigating “recent concerning incidents involving Cruise vehicles in San Francisco.”

“The DMV is in contact with Cruise and law enforcement officials to determine the facts and requested Cruise to immediately reduce its active fleet of operating vehicles by 50% until the investigation is complete and Cruise takes appropriate corrective actions to improve road safety,” the department said in a statement.

That means Cruise, which is the self-driving subsidiary of General Motors, can have no more than 50 driverless cars in operation during the day, and 150 in operation at night, according to the department.

The California DMV said that Cruise has agreed to the request, and a spokesperson from Cruise told CNN that the company is investigating the firetruck crash as well.

The accidents come less than two weeks after California regulators officially gave the green light for Cruise and competitor Waymo to charge money for robotaxi trips around San Francisco at any time of day. Prior to the approval, Cruise was only authorized to offer fared passenger service from driverless cars overnight from 10 pm to 6 am, when there are fewer pedestrians or traffic that could confuse the autonomous vehicle’s software.

The collisions, which both occurred on Thursday, reveal potential risks of driverless technology.

In a blog post, Cruise’s general manager for San Francisco said the firetruck crash occurred when an emergency vehicle that appeared to be en route to an emergency scene moved into an oncoming lane of traffic to bypass a red light. Cruise’s driverless car identified the risk, the blog post said, but it “was ultimately unable to avoid the collision.”

That crash resulted in one passenger being taken to the hospital via ambulance for seemingly minor injuries, according to the company.

Cruise told CNN the other crash on Thursday took place when another car ran a red light “at a high rate of speed.”

“The AV detected the vehicle and braked but the other vehicle made contact with our AV. There were no passengers in our AV and the driver of the other vehicle was treated and released at the scene,” Hannah Lindow, a Cruise spokesperson, told CNN.

It is unclear whether the two accidents would have been avoided had there been a human driver rather than an autonomous vehicle (AV) involved – but the crashes were not the only two incidents involving Cruise’s driverless cars in San Francisco last week.

On Tuesday, Cruise confirmed on X, formerly known as Twitter, that one of its driverless taxis drove into a construction area and stopped in wet concrete.

“This vehicle has already been recovered and we’re in communication with the city about this,” the company said.

The recent events underscore the challenges of creating safe, fully driverless passenger vehicles.

General Motors acquired Cruise Automation in 2016 for $1 billion, solidifying its place in the autonomous vehicles race, but many companies have since scaled back, or abandoned their driverless car ambitions. The endeavor has proven costly, and mastering all situations that humans might face behind the wheel is difficult and time-consuming.

Ridesharing giants Uber and Lyft have both sold autonomous vehicle units in recent years. Even Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who has been optimistic about autonomous vehicle technology, has yet to fully deliver on his promise.

Tesla vehicles now come with the option to add a “full self-driving” feature in beta-testing for $15,000, but drivers must agree to “stay alert, keep your hands on the steering wheel at all times and maintain control of your car.”

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August 2, 2023
Ohio GOP businessman Moreno files for Senate bid | CNN Politics

CNN
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Bernie Moreno, a wealthy Ohio businessman, has filed paperwork to run for Senate in 2024 and challenge Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown in what’s likely to be one of the most competitive races of the upcoming cycle.

Moreno is now the second Republican to officially jump into the race after state Sen. Matt Dolan announced his candidacy in January.

Moreno mounted an unsuccessful campaign for Senate in 2022, loaning his campaign millions from his personal fortune before dropping out of the race ahead of the primary. His decision to drop out came after a meeting with former President Donald Trump, who would go on to endorse one of his rivals, J.D. Vance.

The Cleveland businessman’s entry into the 2024 race sets up another potentially expensive and contentious primary in the state after the 2022 contest, which was driven by several self-funding candidates, was one of the costliest that year.

Other potential candidates who have expressed interest include 8th district Rep. Warren Davidson and Secretary of State Frank La Rose.

Brown is one of several vulnerable Democrats who the party is defending as it seeks to hold its slim majority in the upper chamber. Trump carried the state in 2016 and 2020, and Vance won the 2022 race by nearly 7 points despite a spirited challenge by Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan.

Still, Brown, seeking his fourth term, won his last race in 2018 by nearly 7 points, bolstering Democratic hopes that they can hang on in a state that has trended increasingly Republican over the last several election cycles. And Brown had more than $3.4 million stockpiled in Senate campaign account as of the end of last year.

Democrats, though, will be pressed to defend Brown amid a challenging map that includes other incumbents in similarly vulnerable positions, such as Sen. Joe Manchin in West Virginia and Sen. Jon Tester in Montana, along with an unpredictable three-way race in Arizona.

CORRECTION: This story has been updated to reflect that former President Donald Trump endorsed JD Vance in the 2022 Ohio Senate race after a meeting with Bernie Moreno.

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April 11, 2023
US safety regulators to investigate Tesla for steering wheels that can fall off | CNN Business

New York
CNN
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Federal safety regulators are investigating Tesla’s Model Y SUV after at least two instances in which owners said their steering wheels became detached while the vehicle was being driven.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is looking at the 2023 model year. It said in the two instances in which the steering wheel came off, the cars were delivered to buyers without the retaining bolt that attaches the steering wheel to the steering column.

The report from the agency did not say if there were accidents or injuries as a result of the problem.

NHTSA said around 120,000 vehicles on US roads could be affected by the problem. This is an investigation, a step the agency takes before ordering a recall.

Tesla is not the only company facing safety questions about its steering wheel. Nissan also just disclosed to NHTSA that it is recalling about 1,100 Nissan Ariyas, its electric SUV, because it may be missing a bolt required on its steering wheel.

There were three vehicles found in dealer inventories in which there was too much play in the steering wheels, and upon inspection it was discovered the bolts were missing in each. But in none of those cases did the steering wheel come off while the cars were being driven, and there were no reports of accidents or injuries caused by the missing bolts.

In February, Tesla was required to issue a recall of nearly 363,000 vehicles equipped with what it calls its “Full Self Driving” software after NHTSA determined it “led to an unreasonable risk to motor vehicle safety based on insufficient adherence to traffic safety laws.”

Among the traffic rules the cars violated in FSD mode was “traveling straight through an intersection while in a turn-only lane, entering a stop sign-controlled intersection without coming to a complete stop, or proceeding into an intersection during a steady yellow traffic signal without due caution.”

Tesla CEO Elon Musk objected to calling that a “recall,” saying it entailed only an over-the-air software update that did not require the owner to bring the cars to service centers to be fixed.

But Tesla did order a recall last month of 3,470 2022-2023 Model Y cars due to bolts in the second-row seat back frames not being secured correctly, which could cause the seat belts in those seats to not work properly in a crash.

Tesla has not had a public relations staff for several years and email inquiries to its press office are no longer accepted.

CNN’s Ramishah Maruf contributed to this report.

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March 8, 2023
Tesla recalls almost 3,500 Model Y cars for loose bolts | CNN Business

New York
CNN
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Tesla is recalling 3,470 2022-2023 Model Y cars due to bolts in the second-row seat back frames not being secured properly.

An estimated 4% of cars are affected, a recall report submitted in late February said.

The loose bolts could cause the seat belts to not work properly in a crash, “which may increase the risk of an injury for occupants seated in affected second-row seating positions,” the National Highway Traffic Administration said.

On Model Y vehicles, the second-row driver- and passenger-side seat back frames are secured with four bolts per seat back. But during production for certain Model Y cars, one or more of the bolts securing the seat back frames to the lower seat frame “may not have been torqued to specifications.”

Owners can tell if their car is affected by seeing if their second-row seat back frame folds improperly or if it’s loose and rattles when driving.

Tesla found five warranty claims regarding the bolts since last December, but is not aware of any injuries or deaths due to it.

A driver in Fremont, California, found a faulty seat back bolt last December, triggering a Tesla investigation and risk assessment which ended February 17. A recall determination was made on the same day.

Tesla will inspect the bolts and tighten them if necessary for free of charge, and owner notification letters will be mailed.

The recall was filed the same month Tesla recalled all 363,000 US vehicles with the “Full Self Driving” driver assist software due to safety risks, a significantly larger recall, which was a blow to the automaker’s business model.

The NHTSA said, based on its analysis, Tesla’s “Full Self Driving” feature “led to an unreasonable risk to motor vehicle safety based on insufficient adherence to traffic safety laws.” And it warned the feature could violate traffic laws at some intersections “before some drivers may intervene.”

“The FSD Beta system may allow the vehicle to act unsafe around intersections, such as traveling straight through an intersection while in a turn-only lane, entering a stop sign-controlled intersection without coming to a complete stop, or proceeding into an intersection during a steady yellow traffic signal without due caution,” said the recall notice, posted on NHTSA’s website.

Tesla will attempt to fix the feature, which costs $15,000, through an over-the-air software update, the notice added.

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March 4, 2023
Tesla, Musk sued by shareholders over self-driving safety claims | CNN Business

Reuters
—

Tesla

(TSLA) and its Chief Executive Elon Musk were sued on Monday by shareholders who accused them of overstating the effectiveness and safety of their electric vehicles’ Autopilot and Full Self-Driving technologies.

In a proposed class action filed in San Francisco federal court, shareholders said Tesla defrauded them over four years with false and misleading statements that concealed how its technologies, suspected as a possible cause of multiple fatal crashes, “created a serious risk of accident and injury.”

They said Tesla’s share price fell several times as the truth became known, including after the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration began investigating the technologies, and reports that the Securities and Exchange Commission was investigating Musk’s Autopilot claims.

The share price also fell 5.7% on Feb. 16 after NHTSA forced a recall of more than 362,000 Tesla vehicles equipped with Full Self-Driving beta software because they could be unsafe around intersections.

Tesla has said it acquiesced to the recall, though it disagreed with NHTSA’s analysis.

“As a result of defendants’ wrongful acts and omissions, and the precipitous decline in the market value of the Company’s common stock, plaintiff and other class members have suffered significant losses and damages,” the complaint said.

Tesla, which does not have a media relations department, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Monday’s lawsuit led by shareholder Thomas Lamontagne seeks unspecified damages for Tesla shareholders from Feb. 19, 2019 to Feb. 17, 2023. Chief Financial Officer Zachary Kirkhorn and his predecessor Deepak Ahuja are also defendants.

Tesla’s share price closed Monday up $10.75, or 5.5%, at $207.63, but the stock has lost about half its value since peaking in Nov. 2021.

Musk is expected at Tesla’s March 1 investor day to promote the company’s artificial intelligence capability and plans to expand its vehicle lineup.

The case is Lamontagne v Tesla Inc et al, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, No. 23-00869.

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March 3, 2023
Alphabet’s self-driving car unit has cut 8% of its staff this year | CNN Business

CNN
—

Waymo, the self-driving car division of Google

(GOOGL)’s parent company Alphabet, said on Wednesday that it has cut approximately 8% of its staff across two rounds of layoffs this year.

Some 209 jobs were eliminated in total, after cuts in late January and another more recent round, the company confirmed on Wednesday.

“We took a thoughtful approach and feel confident that we’re providing for each of these former teammates through this transition,” the company said in a statement to CNN Wednesday. “We’re confident that we have the right teams in place to achieve success for Waymo.”

The Waymo job cuts come amid a spate of layoffs in the tech sector, as the industry adjusts to waning demand for digital services years into the pandemic and confronts broader uncertainty in the global economy. Rising interest rates have also dried up the easy access to funding tech companies used to fuel ambitious projects and bets on the future.

Alphabet said in January that it was cutting 12,000 jobs, or 6% of its workforce, after having grown by more than 50,000 employees over the prior two years. The cuts to Waymo highlight how even Alphabet’s most ambitious and high-profile long-term bets are not immune to its renewed focus on reining in costs.

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March 1, 2023
Amazon’s Zoox robotaxi drives on public roads in California for the first time | CNN Business

London
CNN
—

Amazon’s Zoox driverless transportation company has started testing its robotaxi on open public roads — with employees on board, for now.

The company said Monday that it conducted an initial run of its shuttle service for workers at its headquarters in Foster City, California on February 11, a key step in its efforts to make autonomous vehicles widely available.

“With the announcement of the maiden run of our autonomous employee shuttle, we are adding to the progress this industry has seen over the last year and bringing Zoox one step closer to a commercialized purpose-built robotaxi service for the general public,” Zoox CEO Aicha Evans said in a statement.

Full-time employees will now be able to travel in the self-driving taxi on the route between Zoox’s two main office buildings. The vehicle can carry as many as four people at a time and drive at speeds of up to 35 miles per hour.

The startup said its robotaxi — which underwent “rigorous” testing on private roads and has received necessary approvals from the California Department of Motor Vehicles — can handle left- and right-hand turns, traffic lights, pedestrians, vehicles and other potential obstacles on the journey.

Zoox, which was founded in 2014 and purchased by Amazon in 2020, is unique in its approach to designing electric self-driving vehicles.

Most autonomous cars under development resemble those currently on the road. But Zoox has ditched the steering wheel and brake pedal, claiming those features are unnecessary when there’s no human driver. Seats are designed to face each other to facilitate conversation between passengers.

Google, General Motors and other tech and transportation companies have poured billions of dollars into self-driving vehicles for more than a decade with the promise that they would deliver improved safety and convenience for riders. Yet some evangelists have abandoned their efforts in recent months, with high costs and elusive profits becoming harder to stomach as the economy slows.

In October, Ford and Volkswagen, two of the world’s largest automakers, shut down joint efforts to develop self-driving taxis through a venture called Argo AI.

Ford CEO Jim Farley said at the time that he’s still “optimistic” about a future for fully self-driving cars, “but profitable, fully autonomous vehicles at scale are a long way off.” The company wouldn’t necessarily have to create the technology itself, he added.

— Matt McFarland contributed reporting.

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February 16, 2023
Super Bowl ad slams Tesla’s ‘Full Self-Driving’ tech | CNN Business

New York
CNN
—

Electric carmaker Tesla will face a hit on Super Bowl Sunday, when an ad will play showing the alleged dangers of its Full Self-Driving technology.

The commercial, which will be aired in Washington, DC, Austin, Tallahassee, Albany, Atlanta and Sacramento does not paint Tesla in the best light. The ad is part of a multimillion dollar advertising campaign by The Dawn Project. Its founder, Dan O’Dowd, is a California tech CEO who has dedicated millions of his own money (and a failed US Senate race) to the cause.

The ad cost $598,000, a Dawn Project spokesperson told CNN.

It shows a Tesla Model 3, which allegedly has the Full Self-Driving mode turned on, running over a child-sized dummy on a school crosswalk, and then a fake baby in a stroller, in a series of tests by the Dawn Project. In the ad, the car swerves into oncoming traffic, zooms past stopped school buses, and cruises through “do not enter” signs.

“Tesla’s Full Self-Driving is endangering the public,” the ad said. “With deceptive marketing and woefully inept engineering.”

The Dawn Project says it wants to make computer-controlled systems safer for humanity, shooting its own videos as tests of Tesla’s alleged design flaws. In August, O’Dowd published a video showing a Tesla plowing into child-sized mannequins. Some Tesla fans posted their own videos in defense, using their own dummies or even their own children – YouTube has taken down several test videos involving actual children, citing safety risks.

O’Dowd received a cease and desist letter from Tesla over the video, claiming he and the Dawn Project were “disparaging Tesla’s commercial interests and disseminating defamatory information to the public.”

O’Dowd responded to the cease-and-desist with a 1,736-word post in which he pushed back at the suggestion his posts were defamatory, defended his tests and returned barbs from Musk and some Tesla supporters.

O’Dowd, who sold software to the military, is undertaking a campaign of millions of dollars to ban Tesla’s Full Self-Driving feature. He is running national ads and posting online videos displaying the possible dangers of Musk’s technology. He also ran an unsuccessful one-issue campaign for the US Senate on the same message.

Though officially in beta mode, Full Self-Driving is available to any user in North America who wants to purchase the $15,000 feature.

Tesla did not immediately respond to CNN’s request for comment. Tesla’s “Full Self-Driving” system is intended to someday work on city streets, but despite its wide rollout, is still officially in a developmental “beta” program. No car for sale on the market is yet able to drive itself.

Autopilot is a suite of driver-assist features, while Full Self-Driving steers the car on city streets, but could also stop for traffic signals and make turns.

Tesla contends it is not aware of any ongoing government investigation that has concluded any wrongdoing occurred, and said its Autopilot, with its automated steering designed to keep a car within a lane, is safer than normal driving.

“Tesla’s reckless deployment of Full Self-Driving software on public roads is a major threat to public safety. Elon Musk has released software that will run down children in school crosswalks, swerve into oncoming traffic and hit a baby in a stroller to all Tesla owners in North America,” O’Dowd said in a statement.

Tesla said it “has received requests from the Department of Justice for documents related to Tesla’s Autopilot and FSD features” in a January 31 public filing.

Federal investigators are looking into a Musk tweet about disabling driver alerts on Tesla’s “Full Self Driving” driver assist system, joining several other National Highway Traffic Safety Administration probes.

On December 31, Musk replied to a tweet by @WholeMarsBlog which said “users with more than 10,000 miles on FSD Beta should be given the option to turn off the steering wheel nag.”

“Agreed, update coming in Jan,” Musk replied.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced last summer it was escalating its Tesla probe to an “engineering analysis,” a step toward seeking a recall. NHTSA first investigated Tesla’s driver-assist technology after reports Autopilot-engaged vehicles were crashing into emergency vehicles stopped at the scene of earlier crashes.

O’Dowd is the founder and CEO of Green Hills Software. Some of Musk’s defenders claim O’Dowd has a conflict of interest as one of its customers is Intel-owned Mobileye, which makes a computer chip to run driver-assisted software, the Washington Post reported.

O’Dowd told the Washington Post Mobileye is one of his hundreds of customers and that his main motivation is safety.

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February 12, 2023
Tesla video promoting self-driving was staged, engineer testifies | CNN Business

CNN
—

A 2016 video that Tesla

(TSLA) (TSLA) used to promote its self-driving technology was staged to show capabilities like stopping at a red light and accelerating at a green light that the system did not have, according to testimony by a senior engineer.

The video, which remains archived on Tesla’s website, was released in October 2016 and promoted on Twitter by Chief Executive Elon Musk as evidence that “Tesla drives itself.”

But the Model X was not driving itself with technology Tesla had deployed, Ashok Elluswamy, director of Autopilot software at Tesla, said in the transcript of a July deposition taken as evidence in a lawsuit against Tesla for a 2018 fatal crash involving a former Apple

(AAPL) (AAPL) engineer.

The previously unreported testimony by Elluswamy represents the first time a Tesla employee has confirmed and detailed how the video was produced.

The video carries a tagline saying: “The person in the driver’s seat is only there for legal reasons. He is not doing anything. The car is driving itself.”

Elluswamy said Tesla’s Autopilot team set out to engineer and record a “demonstration of the system’s capabilities” at the request of Musk.

Elluswamy, Musk and Tesla did not respond to a request for comment. However, the company has warned drivers that they must keep their hands on the wheel and maintain control of their vehicles while using Autopilot.

The Tesla technology is designed to assist with steering, braking, speed and lane changes but its features “do not make the vehicle autonomous,” the company says on its website.

To create the video, the Tesla used 3D mapping on a predetermined route from a house in Menlo Park, California, to Tesla’s then-headquarters in Palo Alto, he said.

Drivers intervened to take control in test runs, he said. When trying to show the Model X could park itself with no driver, a test car crashed into a fence in Tesla’s parking lot, he said.

“The intent of the video was not to accurately portray what was available for customers in 2016. It was to portray what was possible to build into the system,” Elluswamy said, according to a transcript of his testimony seen by Reuters.

When Tesla released the video, Musk tweeted, “Tesla drives itself (no human input at all) thru urban streets to highway to streets, then finds a parking spot.”

Tesla faces lawsuits and regulatory scrutiny over its driver assistance systems.

The U.S. Department of Justice began a criminal investigation into Tesla’s claims that its electric vehicles can drive themselves in 2021, after a number of crashes, some of them fatal, involving Autopilot, Reuters has reported.

The New York Times reported in 2021 that Tesla engineers had created the 2016 video to promote Autopilot without disclosing that the route had been mapped in advance or that a car had crashed in trying to complete the shoot, citing anonymous sources.

When asked if the 2016 video showed the performance of the Tesla Autopilot system available in a production car at the time, Elluswamy said, “It does not.”

Elluswamy was deposed in a lawsuit against Tesla over a 2018 crash in Mountain View, California, that killed Apple engineer Walter Huang.

Andrew McDevitt, the lawyer who represents Huang’s wife and who questioned Elluswamy’s in July, told Reuters it was “obviously misleading to feature that video without any disclaimer or asterisk.”

The National Transportation Safety Board concluded in 2020 that Huang’s fatal crash was likely caused by his distraction and the limitations of Autopilot. It said Tesla’s “ineffective monitoring of driver engagement” had contributed to the crash.

Elluswamy said drivers could “fool the system,” making a Tesla system believe that they were paying attention based on feedback from the steering wheel when they were not. But he said he saw no safety issue with Autopilot if drivers were paying attention.

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January 17, 2023
From color-changing cars to self-driving strollers, here’s some of the coolest tech from CES 2023 | CNN Business

CNN
—

A long list of companies once again showed off an assortment of cutting edge technology and oddball gadgets at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas last week.

There were new twists on foldable devices, cars that changed colors and smart ovens that live streamed dinners. There was a self-driving stroller, a pillow that pulsates to reduce anxiety and a locker from LG that claims to deodorize smelly sneakers in less than 40 minutes. At the event, some people gathered in groups, sitting in silence, to test out the latest virtual reality products.

While some of these devices may never find their way into households, the products on display offer a glimpse at some of the biggest tech trends companies are anticipating this year and in the years ahead.

Here’s a look at some of the buzziest products announced last week:

BMW unveiled a wild color-changing concept car with 260 e-panels that can change up to 32 colors. During a demo, different parts of the car, including the wheel covers, flashed in varying hues and swirls of colors. The technology, which relies on panels that receive electrical impulses, isn’t ready for production. (Breaks between panels and what looked like wiring could be seen on the outside of the car.) But just imagine being able to drive a sporty red car on the weekends and then a conservative gray model when you go to work.

If you think snapping photos of your meal for Instagram is overdone, now you can livestream your dinner as it cooks in real time and post it to your social feeds. Samsung’s new AI Wall oven features an internal camera that can capture footage of your baking food or allow you to keep tabs on it without ever leaving the couch. The oven, which uses an algorithm to recognize dishes and suggest cooking times and temperatures, also pushes notifications to your phone to prevent you from burning meals. The oven will launch in North America later this year; a price has not yet been announced.

Canadian-based baby gear startup Gluxkind was showed off its Ella AI Powered Smart Stroller. It offers much of the same tech seen in autonomous cars and delivery robots, including a dual-motor system for uphill walks and automatic downhill brake assist. It’s meant to serve as an “extra pairs of eyes and an extra set of hands,” according to the company’s website – not a replacement for a caregiver. The Ella stroller is able to drive itself for hands-free strolling – but only when a child is not inside.

No gadget at CES this year was as striking as the Mutalk mouthpiece from startup Shiftall. The device, which looks like a muzzle, features a soundproof Bluetooth microphone that makes it difficult for others in the room to hear your voice when you’re on calls. The company thinks the $200 gadget will come in handy for everything from voice chats and playing online games to shouting in VR when you don’t want to disturb anyone else nearby. Instead of hearing you, they will simply see your new mouthpiece; you can decide which is worse.

If you ever wanted to hit 15 miles per hour on roller skates, this electric pair from French startup AtmosGear promises to help get you there. With a battery pack that holds an hour charge and the ability to travel over 12 miles, the skates can clip onto any existing roller skates, turning them into motor-propelled footwear. The skates are currently available for pre-order for $525.

You’ve probably heard of smartphones that come with headphones, but what about headphones that come with a screen? The JBL Tour Pro 2 earbuds adds a touchscreen to the case to bring smartwatch-like capabilities by allowing users to control its settings, answer calls, set alarms, manage music and check battery life. No launch date has been announced, but the new buds will cost $250 when they eventually go on sale.

Some companies offered a new twist on the foldable phone concept. For example, Samsung Display’s Flex Hybrid prototype features a foldable and slidable display (the right side slides to offer more screen space). Meanwhile, the Asus $3500 Zenbook 17 Fold OLED – the world’s first foldable 17-inch laptop – picked up significant buzz on the show floor, acting almost like a large tablet that can be folded in half when on the go.

Dubbed “the world’s first awareable,” the $500 Nowatch is a watch… with no clock. The Amsterdam-based startup of the same name launched the device to help users monitor stress, body temperature, heart rate, movement and sleep. But unlike other smartwatches, there’s no watchface – instead, a gemstone sits where the touchscreen display typically goes. “We’ve replaced the traditional watch face with ancient stones, celebrating the belief that time is NOW,” the company said on its website.

Honda and Sony have joined forces to create tech-filled electric cars that, they say, will be both fun to drive and filled with the latest entertainment innovation. According to the CEO of Sony Honda Mobility, its cars will recognize your moods and be highly communicative and sensitive to your needs. The car will have screens on the outside so it can “express itself” and share information and will be able to “detect and understand people and society by utilizing sensing and [artificial intelligence] technologies,” according to the company. That’s why the company named its first joint car brand Afeela, in that it just has to “feel” right. But it’s unclear if we’re afeeling that name.

While it typically requires a blood panel and a visit to the doctor’s office to learn more about vitamin deficiencies, Withins says its new $500 U-Scan device can tell you similar information right from the comfort of your own toilet. The device attaches to existing toilets and collects data from your urine stream to detect vitamin deficiencies, check hydration and monitor metabolism, according to the company. An additional device called the U-Scan Cycle Sync tracks periods and ovulation cycles.

Schlage’s new smart lock is one of the first to work with Apple’s Home Key functionality, which allows users to upload their keys to their Apple Wallet and unlock their deadbolted front door directly from their phone or Apple Watch. The lock also works with Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant for voice controlled, hands-free locking. Available in two finishes, the deadbolt can manage access codes, view lock history and handle multiple locks at once. The lock, which will cost $300, will be available for purchase late this spring, according to a company press release.

– CNN’s Peter Valdes-Depena contributed to this report

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January 11, 2023
A $3,300 self-driving stroller is at this year’s CES. Are parents ready? | CNN Business

New York
CNN
—

Hang onto your baby bonnets: Self-driving technology is coming to strollers.

Canadian-based baby gear startup Gluxkind was showing off its Ella AI Powered Smart Stroller at this year’s CES, the consumer electronics show in Las Vegas that offers some of the most cutting edge – and out-there – new technologies.

The smart stroller offers much of the same tech seen in autonomous cars and delivery robots, including a dual-motor system for uphill walks and automatic downhill brake assist. Like a Tesla with “Autopilot,” the Gluxkind’s stroller’s onboard technolgy has sensors that detect objects around it – but it’s meant to serve as an “extra pairs of eyes and an extra set of hands,” according to the company’s website – not a replacement for a caregiver.

The Ella stroller is able to drive itself for hands-free strolling – but only when a child is not inside. It uses cameras to monitor surroundings and navigate the sidewalks.

For parents who are probably and understandably nervous about putting their baby in a stroller with a mind of its own, Gluxkind provided a YouTube video with some use cases. A parent walking a stroller down hill rushes to save a child’s dropped toy that is rolling away. The stroller brakes on its own.

In another demo, a child is tired of sitting in the stroller and wants to be carried. The Ella strolls itself while the parent carries the child.

Still self-driving technology isn’t totally proven and certainly not ready for prime time. Although companies that have implemented the technology in cars say they add an element of safety when used properly and the driver is paying attention, putting children in the care of AI may not be for everyone.

Gluxkind, founded in 2020, also put additional stroller-specific features into the Ella including “Automatic Rock-My-Baby” and a built-in white noise machine to soothe sleeping toddlers. The entire system is outfitted with a car seat, infant bassinet and toddler seat.

“The development has been driven by our own experience as new parents.,” Anne Hunger, Gluxkind CPO and co-founder, wrote in a November press release. “We’ve put a lot of hard work into this product and are excited to get it into more customers’ hands in 2023.”

For $3,300, parents can join the pre-order list for the 30-pound Ella, one of the consumer tech products named as an Innovation Awards Honoree at the 2023 CES show. Deliveries of the stroller are expected to begin in April 2023, according to the company website.

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January 4, 2023
Uber launching self-driving cars in Las Vegas | CNN Business

New York
CNN Business
—

Ridehailing giant Uber is now offering Las Vegas riders the option on its app to hail a self-driving taxis developed by another company, according to a press release Wednesday. While the autonomous vehicles are currently only available for ride hailing in Las Vegas, there are plans to expand to Los Angeles “at a later date,” according to the release.

The robocars, made by driverless technology company Motional, are sent with two “vehicle operators” behind the wheel to monitor the technology and provide added support to riders. Uber said it plans on launching a fully driverless service with Motional in 2023.

Users requesting a ride will be offered an autonomous vehicle if one is available before the trip is confirmed. If a customer opts in, a self-driing Hyundai Ioniq 5 mid-sized hatchback, modified by Motional, will be sent to pick them up.

Motional has been offering robotaxi services in Las Vegas since 2018 through Uber rival Lyft, though rides before 2020 were offered under parent-company Aptiv.

Uber and Motional first announced their non-exclusive 10-year agreement in October, two years after the ride-hailing company sold off its own self-driving unit, Advanced Technologies Group, to San Francisco-based startup Aurora. The sale came after a a five-year run of developing self-driving vehicles that was marred by litigation and a fatal crash.

Waymo, Google’s self-driving company, sued Uber in February 2017 alleging trade secret and intellectual property theft, with Waymo eventually receiving about $245 million in Uber stock as part of settlement and Uber agreeing not to use proprietary information from Waymo. The ridehailing company suffered another blow to its self-driving program a month later when one of its test vehicles in Tempe, Arizona, struck and killed a pedestrian. An Uber test driver behind the wheel, who was supposed to monitor the vehicle and intervene if needed, was watching a television show on her phone.

Through its partnership with Motional, Uber is attempting to shift its business model away from being solely reliant on its vast fleet of independently contracted drivers, a business model that has posed legal issues for the company in recent years. The Biden administration is currently proposing a new labor rule that could classify millions of these gig workers as employees — a move that would challenge the low-cost labor models behind Silicon Valley heavyweights like Uber.

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December 9, 2022
Get Ready to Share the Road with a Self-Driving Vehicle

Dec. 8, 2022 – What are the cars of the future, and what impact could they have on public health?

Drivers around Silicon Valley have glanced out their car window to see the vehicle cruising alongside them has no one in the driver’s seat. Tech companies in California have been testing their new self-driving vehicles, and similar experiments are hitting the road elsewhere as the new technology moves onto streets.

Capable of sensing the environment and moving with little or no human input, these new autonomous ground vehicles are already navigating traffic on public roads. They combine an assortment of cameras and sensors such as radar, sonar, and GPS.

But are a suite of sensors and an algorithm ready to safely take the wheel on the road with us?

Police reported more than 5.2 million motor vehicle crashes in 2020, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation, which resulted in 2 million injuries and more than 25,500 deaths.

Advocates for self-driving vehicles say the biggest cause of most traffic accidents is human error, so taking the driver out of the equation with self-driving vehicles could lead to fewer injuries and deaths. As a future technology, self-driving vehicles are predicted to transform the automobile and insurance industries and change how our cities are planned as traffic patterns evolve.

For a couple of years now, drivers in Bentonville, AR, have been sharing the road with autonomous trucks delivering goods for Walmart. And those trucks now no longer have a driver on hand, ready to take over from the computer if anything goes wrong. The trucks are currently operating independently on the open road.

It’s not clear what society’s tolerance for crashes or injuries caused by autonomous vehicles will be, even if they happen at a much lower rate than human-caused ones.

In Toronto, similar autonomous trucks are delivering supplies for Canadian grocery chain Loblaws. These deliveries focus on the so-called middle mile and move goods from central depots to front-line stores.

New Driverless Delivery Trucks

The stores launching self-driving vehicles suggest this is the best way to roll them out on public roads because these trips are relatively short and predictable. That means the trucks can run the same route over and over, collecting data on traffic patterns and weather, and that can help refine the algorithm for future trips.

As the technology improves, and if projects like the ones in Bentonville and Toronto are successful, the number of self-driving cars and trucks on the roads could multiply quickly – with profound potential effects on public health.

Supporters of the new technology predict less traffic congestion with autonomous vehicles and therefore less stress and even better air quality, with fewer cars on the road creating emissions.

But Andrew Dannenberg, MD, an epidemiologist and professor of urban design and planning at the University of Washington in Seattle, says the reality of what is planned is more nuanced, and a lot will depend on how self-driving vehicles are actually integrated onto our roads.

Who Is the More Dangerous Driver?

Traffic will only be reduced, he says, if vehicles are shared, which is not particularly popular with most drivers currently travelling alone.

Early experiments where a driver was provided to individuals to be chauffeured to imitate the convenience of a self-driving car found that people drove significantly more when they had the convenience of not driving themselves, says Danneberg.

“If it is too convenient, there will be the same or even more congestion on roads.”

And the effect on air pollution is probably relatively neutral, he says. Most of the improvements will come from switching to electric vehicles, which is happening already even before self-driving cars are widely adopted.

Wide access to self-driving vehicles could also lead to people being less active, and less healthy, Danneberg says.

“Physical activity is a big part of transport. But will people walk, bike, or take public transit less if these cars are so convenient? Losing support for transit is not in the public health interest,” he says.

But could a combination of good public transit and efficient autonomous vehicles fix our traffic problems? That’s possible, if the self-driving vehicles are in the majority, and can communicate with each other to cooperate during rush hour, says Edmond Awad, PhD, who studies the interactions between humans and autonomous vehicles at the University of Exeter in the U.K.

A lot will depend on how the algorithms governing new self-driving vehicles are designed, he explains, and how they alter the level of risk that people have gotten used to on the roads.

Teaching the New Algorithms to Drive

There is a general perception that machines are less biased than humans, says Awad, but since the algorithms are trained on human data, they tend to have the same biases. And they could even make them worse, by putting the same flawed algorithm in hundreds of thousands of vehicles.

“If the algorithm makes cars less cautious around cyclists than the average driver, for example, that will change the distribution of risk,” he warns. And since we don’t generally know what’s going on inside that algorithm, it makes it difficult for people to trust the vehicles and know how to behave around them.

Awad studied how people thought about the algorithms governing autonomous vehicles in a project called The Moral Machine. He gave people hypothetical situations where a self-driving car detects a collision that is about to happen. If the vehicle can’t avoid the crash, what could it do next? Collide according to trajectory or swerve to save lives? An algorithm that protects human life would be best, but what happens if veering hits someone else? What if the self-driving car is about to hit a bus, and to avoid all those people on public transit means it drives off the road and kills its own passengers? Should the car be programed to never risk its owners? But what about the crowds of people in public spaces? How will programmers decide whose safety to prioritize?

Awad found in his study exploring hypothetical situations that while most people were in favor of self-driving cars that were programmed in a utilitarian way – that is, the car would sacrifice its own passengers to save greater numbers of other people – people in the study also reported they would prefer not to ride in such cars themselves.

Those designing the vehicles will need to balance the competing priorities of individuals and society at large if the technology is ever going to be accepted in public spaces around other drivers, cyclists, and pedestrians who could be put at risk.

And should self-driving cars have their own closed roads to operate on?

Beyond questions about individual safety, though, there is a whole host of questions about the equity of the transition to autonomous vehicles, says Dannenberg. He is involved in several active outreach projects to determine what communities want from autonomous vehicles. He has found that many lower-income or otherwise marginalized communities have little input or interest in the issue.

They are generally not in contact with the politicians and technology leaders who are deciding where, when, and how the vehicles will be rolled out, and so are not high on the priority list, says Dannenberg.

“If the only people who care about this are well-off, that’s a big equity issue.”

Marginalized communities face larger barriers to adopting the technology, either through price, access to other enabling technologies like smartphones, or simply which neighborhoods are served by autonomous vehicle projects.

Many jobs in transportation will also be replaced by the vehicles, a burden that will fall unequally on those with lower incomes or less education.

Those with disabilities may also face greater barriers, if there is no human on hand to help wheelchair users get in and out of the vehicles they want to travel in.

“It’s not automatically great for disabilities,” says Dannenberg. That’s an issue that can be solved with clever design, but it requires careful thought and comes with a cost.

Dannenberg says the equity issues are getting less attention than they deserve as society prepares to adopt more self-driving vehicles, so more people from different sectors and communities need to get involved in driving this change in a direction we want to go.

One way or another, people are in the driver’s seat of this technological advance.

“And we will need ongoing monitoring and evaluation,” Dannenberg says.

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December 8, 2022