Uber’s partner Volvo has meanwhile also confirmed its development of self-driven auto technology.
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Uber will purchase Volvos and then install its own driverless control system for the specific needs of its ride-hailing service. Volvo will develop base vehicles for research and both companies will design autonomous vehicles on their own.
The Swedish automaker is teaming up with Uber to develop autonomous driving ride-sharing fleet akin the GM-Lyft effort.
Uber unveiled its first self-driving auto in May, announcing it had begun testing an autonomous vehicle on the streets of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Uber Chief Executive Travis Kalanick said the technology is necessary to lower the cost of ride hailing and vehicle ownership, even if it means the future loss of jobs among Uber’s 1.5 million active drivers world-wide.
Travis Kalanick, Uber’s chief executive, said: “More than one million people die in vehicle accidents every year”. For the Pittsburgh trial and elsewhere, Uber will buy cars and provide the self-driving technology. Volvo and Uber said their engineers will closely work together and the collaboration is a long-term project.
Volvo Cars, which was acquired by Chinese automaker Geely in 2010, employs almost 29,000 people worldwide.
CEO Kalanich said that Without drivers, the cost of hailing a ride will be cheaper than owning a auto, changing the way we all get around.
Otto first came to the attention of the wider world after it released a kit that would let you retroactively turn a truck into a semi-autonomous vehicle, allowing the driver to let the truck drive by itself on major motorways.
Walker Smith said that the real breakthrough for autonomous cars will be, when a company puts one on public roads without a human backup.
Though the Google auto project just lost its director, Chris Urmson, it has a big head start on Uber and others. Pittsburgh is Uber’s base for autonomous testing.
“In fact, I think, in an autonomous world, it goes up”, Kalanick said, claiming that there will be places or conditions where self-driving cars will not be able to go on their own, requiring a human behind the wheel.
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– Uber is buying Otto, a San Francisco startup developing self-driving commercial trucks.
