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"At the time, none of the major automakers had spelled out a serious plan for getting fully self-driving cars on the road." Even if it had worked out, a deal w
by skywhopper 9y ago
"At the time, none of the major automakers had spelled out a serious plan for getting fully self-driving cars on the road."
Even if it had worked out, a deal with Waymo would not have been a "serious plan". This deal only amounted to throwing money at a hype factory in order to gain credibility in an imaginary market. Waymo hasn't proven it's even on track to create a workable product in the next decade. Google in particular has a proven track record of having a very short attention span. They won't make a good partner in the long run, no matter what. Carmakers like Ford would be a lot better off playing the long game on this, focusing on building out practical semi-automated safety features in the proven iterative manner they know, and growing their own expertise in self-driving engineering in-house.
- SA500 9y agoGoogle have been doing this for longer than anyone else and have logged an order of magnitude more miles (cf. all their competitors combined). They also have by far and away the most accurate/reliable technology as evidenced by their dis/engagement stats. They are years ahead of everyone else. As a separate company they would be valued at ~$70 billion- with huge upside
- LoSboccacc 9y agoI don't see how people could be tricked to buy a google car with the expectation of the controlling software being obsolete in a couple year and left unupdated as the sensor technology improves. That alone makes google a risky partner for any serious automaker - they're better of as a partner to a leasing agency than a seller.
- true_tuna 9y agoHa! You have a point there.
- true_tuna 9y agoI think Tesla actually has more miles logged, although that's explicitly not autonomous. I bet Tesla is a close second in terms of tech and the ability to bring full autonomous control to market.
- bluGill 9y agoFord outsources a lot of work of this type, as does everyone else. However Ford does watch their partners (how much I don't know. My studies of Honda says Honda is concerned about their suppliers, but I never got interested enough in the subject to see how/if it generalizes)
- Eridrus 9y agoI don't know how you can accuse Google of having a short attention span when it comes to self-driving cars. They've been working on this since 2009. Google does launch experimental projects and does kill them off if they fail, but I don't see why you think this would be true with Waymo.