Three advantages that jump out at me: 1. Stability for the project. A self-driving R&D project internal to a larger company risks getting killed over the N y

Three advantages that jump out at me: 1. Stability for the project. A self-driving R&D project internal to a larger company risks getting killed over the N years it takes to do the work without any payoff. 2. The investment probably looks better on the parent corporations budgets. They aren't sinking billions of dollars into R&D, they're investing in a third party which is sinking billions into R&D. The shares might even look good, if non-liquid, on paper. 3. Segments liability away from the larger company. When all self-driving cars in the world make a left turn at the same time due to an obscure calendar bug, it's just GM Cruise that gets sued out of existence.