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Waymo is the only one actually scaling driverless taxis. They’ve gone from providing public rides in 1 city (Phoenix) to 3 cities (+SF, LA) with a 4th one (+Aus
by ra7 2y ago
Waymo is the only one actually scaling driverless taxis. They’ve gone from providing public rides in 1 city (Phoenix) to 3 cities (+SF, LA) with a 4th one (+Austin) coming soon. They’ve given more than a million rides, with the majority of them coming in the last year. No one else is doing this.
If other companies thought they’d hitch on to Waymo after they started giving rides in 2017, then that’s on them. Because Waymo has been pretty clear that their scaling is going to be methodical and not instantaneous.
- SoftTalker 2y ago"Taxi service in a congested urban area" is probably the market where it makes the most sense. Trips are pretty short, cars stay in the a local area where they have hyper-accurate mapping data, and are likely to quickly find another passenger or can return to a nearby parking/waiting area. Waymo won't keep a monopoly on this forever. There are still high barriers to entry, but they will fall sooner or later. If there is money to be made, competition will come.
- ra7 2y agoIndeed congested urban areas are their market. That's exactly why they are in two of the largest taxi markets (SF and LA) where it doesn't snow. I'm not sure about barriers to entry lowering soon. First off, this is an incredibly hard problem no one else seems to have cracked (and even Waymo has a long way to go). Second, they could help influence regulation that requires extremely high safety records, mandatory sensors, etc. which could make it harder for others to compete. It's all very early though.