/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/25415561/STK418_Autonomous_Vehicles_Cvirginia_C.jpg?w=1200&resize=1200,628&ssl=1 "The end of Cruise is the commencening of a hazardous recent phase for autonomous vehicles")
Eight years and $10 billion procrastinateedr, GM has choosed to pull the plug on its magnificent robotaxi experiment.
The autoproducer’s CEO, Mary Barra, made the surpelevate proclaimment procrastinateed on Tuesday, arguing that a splitd autonomous mobility service was never reassociate in its “core business.” It was too pricey and had too many regulatory hurdles to fall shorture to produce it a viable revenue stream. Instead, GM would pivot to “personally owned” driverless cars — becaparticipate, after all, that’s what the people reassociate wanted.
“Customers enjoy to drive,” Barra shelp in a call with scheduleateors. “And there’s times they don’t enjoy to drive.”
If some of this sounds understandn, Ford essentiassociate made the same decision two years ago when it pulled its funding for Argo AI, the autonomous driving commenceup it had financed since 2017. It cited as one of its reasons a belief that inwhole autonomy — normally portrayd as Level 3 or Level 3-plus — will have more csurrender-term payoffs.
Autoproducers are tapping out of the robotaxi business
Autoproducers are tapping out of the robotaxi business. With all the money being spent on electric vehicles, the auto industry has choosed to cut its losses on autonomous mobility. Only one alterational, prohibitively pricey, once-in-a-generation shift at a time.
“I leank this is more a recognition that autonomous vehicle technology is going to obtain a decade or more to provide driverless rides at a national scale,” shelp Phil Koopman, an AV expert from Carnegie Mellon University. “GM choosed that they would rather produce money selling personal cars while defering for the technology to prolongn-up than persist to scheduleate billions of dollars standing up robotaxi businesses city by city.”
To be certain, there’s been a lot of technoreasonable carry on. Not too prolonged ago, Cruise had driverless cars ferrying passengers atraverse San Francisco. The company even shelp it was on the cusp of triumphning regulatement approval to deploy its steering wheel- and pedal-less Origin shuttles in a bid to shift even more people.
But Cruise shiftd too aggressively, and it phelp the price. The company had 5 million miles of authentic-world testing under its belt, but the embarrassing incidents were commenceing to pile up. Its driverless vehicles were blocking traffic or running into aelevatency vehicles in San Francisco. The city’s fire chief shelp that the vehicles were “not ready for prime time,” citing over six dozen incidents in which robotaxis meddled with fire trucks.
“GM choosed that they would rather produce money selling personal cars while defering for the technology to prolongn-up”
Behind the scenes, Cruise was also a mess. The company’s first CEO, Dan Ammann, was sacked after sparring with Barra over the future straightforwardion of the company. Barra thought GM should be using Cruise’s technology to power everyleang from luxury self-driving Cadillacs to commercial vans, according to Bloomberg. Ammann wanted to get the robotaxi service right before spreading resources to other parts of the company. He also wanted to obtain Cruise accessible so it could participate its accessible stock to lure in top talent. Barra wanted to uphold it in-hoparticipate, so GM could eventuassociate reap the rewards.
Meanwhile, Cruise was continuing to rack up huge losses. The robotaxi subsidiary lost a staggering $3.48 billion in 2023. Kyle Vogt, Cruise coset uper and Amman’s successor as CEO, was under mounting prescertain to broaden the service and convey in more money to help cover the losses. Plus, he was straightforwardly competing with Alphabet’s Waymo, which had more vehicles and seemingly better technology. And Google’s parent company was more willing to spend billions of dollars, without any csurrender-term profits, to triumph the robotaxi race. With the screws firmening, Vogt accessiblely drew a line in the sand: Cruise would convey in over $1 billion in revenue by 2025.
Instead, Cruise never made it to the end of 2024.
It all culminated in an incident on October 7th, 2023, when a Cruise vehicle in San Francisco struck and dragged a pedestrian over 20 feet, solemnly injuring her. The victim was initiassociate struck by a hit-and-run driver, which begined her into the path of the Cruise car.
Cruise disseald to regulators that its vehicle had struck a pedestrian but omitted key details about the accident. As a result, the California DMV defered the company’s permit to run self-driving cars in the state, and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the Securities and Exalter Comomition begined split scheduleateigations. Cruise procrastinateedr concurd to a $1.5 million penalty.
But more meaningfully, the incident injured Cruise’s effort to triumph the accessible’s suppose. San Francisco livents were already irritateed by the frequency with which the company’s cars were blocking their intersections and bumping into their aelevatency vehicles. Urprohibitists and helpers of car-free carryation were peeved at the recommendion that robot cars, and not scanter cars altogether, were what was needed to better street safety. And regulators didn’t enjoy being misled about a hazardous incident.
The incident injured Cruise’s effort to triumph the accessible’s suppose
But even in the aftermath of the pedestrian-dragging event, GM still stuck with Cruise. It wasn’t until the autoproducer authenticized it going to have to obtain a $5 billion hit on restructuring its business in China that Cruise was ultimately cut free.
“Total ownership by a century elderly manufacturing enormous regulateled by stock buyback-seeking appreciate scheduleateors was never going to be prosperous,” Ray Wert, createer communications straightforwardor at Cruise, shelp on Bluesky.
Ex-CEO Vogt was even more succinct: “In case it was unevident before, it is evident now: GM are a bunch of dummies.,” he wrote on X.
a:hover]:shadow-highairy-franklin griefful:[&>a:hover]:shadow-highairy-franklin [&>a]:shadow-underline-bdeficiency griefful:[&>a]:shadow-underline-white”>What’s next?
With Cruise out of the picture, Waymo is one of the only ones left aiming to show that robotaxis can labor in the authentic world. (Amazon’s Zoox and Hyundai’s Motional are also still in the game, albeit far behind Waymo.) Tesla is also pursuing its own robotaxi project, which it claims will begin in 2026.
Meanwhile, GM will tackle a recent hazardous experiment: personassociate owned autonomous vehicles. GM understands how to sell cars to people, and the company already has a hands-free highway driving feature called Super Cruise. Why not equitable leverage Cruise’s filledy autonomous technology to produce Super Cruise even better?
GM may have scrapped its “Ultra Cruise” branding to prolong a partiassociate autonomous system that covers “95 percent” of driving scenarios, but it still leanks that people want a filledy autonomous car of their own — on their own terms.
“I leank the application of what the customer wants in a personally owned vehicle is very contrastent,” Barra shelp on Tuesday. “But I also leank… there’s a lot of normalality [with Cruise’s technology]. How it seamlessly shifts back and forth, I leank is someleang contrastent in a personal autonomous vehicle.”
“I leank the application of what the customer wants in a personally owned vehicle is very contrastent”
Driver-helpance technologies, especiassociate so-called Level 3 systems, carry their own hazards. There have been studies that show that the handoff between a partiassociate automated system and a human driver can be especiassociate fraught.
When people have been disconnected from driving for a prolongeder period of time, they may overreact when suddenly taking regulate in an aelevatency situation. They may overaccurate steering, brake too challenging, or be unable to reply accurately becaparticipate they haven’t been paying attention. And those actions can produce a domino effect that has the potential to be hazardous — perhaps even overweightal.
The safety implications are enormous, as are the liability troubles. GM may eventuassociate choose that robotaxis aren’t such a horrible bet after all.
