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Waymo has raised over $5.5 billion and has thousands of employees without so much as a product. If this were any other startup it would be considered insane an
by bko 5y ago
Waymo has raised over $5.5 billion and has thousands of employees without so much as a product.
If this were any other startup it would be considered insane and never gotten to this point. Don't know why people keep dumping money into this project thinking they're just around the corner.
Even Tesla sold some cars when it raised a fraction of that amount, and $70 million came from Musk
> By January 2009, Tesla had raised US$187 million and delivered 147 cars. [0]
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Tesla,_Inc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Tesla,_Inc.
- ctvo 5y agoBecause when they succeed it will return more than the investment? By many times? The product is being tested. Many things, including life changing drugs, are developed this way. We both agree Waymo definitely doesn’t sell its half baked product calling it Full Self Driving before it’s ready.
- bko 5y agoWhy do you need to jump to "Full Self Driving"? Presumably there are intermediaries. They're whole plan lacks a feedback mechanism. You don't even know the return if they succeed. Drug companies have a long history so they can anticipate the cost of development, odds of success and payoff if successful. They do all these things prior to any investments being made. The closest Waymo has is # of truck drivers * salary = profit. The top-down Waymo method is a failure.
- sidibe 5y ago> Why do you need to jump to "Full Self Driving"? Presumably there are intermediaries. They've explained this very often. Unlike Tesla, they don't think you can go through the intermediaries without the dangerous situation of drivers not paying attention because it usually works. Based on their experiences a decade ago of employees using it as drivers assist, people check out and it becomes more and more dangerous even if the software is improving.
- tialaramex 5y agoSo, wait, you believe Waymo One is free? That seems like a pretty significant subsidy for everybody who lives in the region served by it.
- bko 5y agoSo their plan is to go into cities one by one, map out the terrain to the centimeter and have a few thousand engineers support each region in which they operate? I don't even know what their plan is. Do they want to sell cars, operate trucks, license out the software, have robo-taxis?
- sidibe 5y agoNot sure if you are honestly asking or just expressing skepticism but right now it's clearly robotaxis then trucks. They've talked about the rest but much less. As far as expansion plans there's no reason to think each place they go will require thousands of engineers.
- ilaksh 5y agoThey have had a working product for many months. And although it does occasionally have issues, it is remarkably reliable.