Waymo

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Waymo LLC
TypeSubsidiary
IndustryAutonomous cars
PredecessorGoogle Self-Driving Car Project
FoundedJanuary 17, 2009; 12 years ago (January 17, 2009) (as the Google Self-Driving Car Project)
December 13, 2016; 4 years ago (2016-12-13) (as Waymo)
Headquarters
Mountain View, California
,
U.S.
Key people
Parent
Websitewaymo.com
Waymo Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid undergoing testing in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Waymo LLC is an American autonomous driving technology development company. It is a subsidiary of Alphabet Inc, the parent company of Google. Waymo operates a commercial self-driving taxi service in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area called "Waymo One", with Chandler, Arizona fully mapped. In October 2020, the company expanded the service to the public, and it is the only self-driving commercial service that operates without safety backup drivers in the vehicle.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8] Waymo also develops driving technology for use in other vehicles, including delivery vans and Class 8 tractor-trailers for delivery and logistics.

Waymo is run by co-CEOs Tekedra Mawakana and Dmitri Dolgov.[9] The company has raised $3 billion in two outside funding rounds.[10] Waymo has partnerships with multiple vehicle manufacturers to integrate Waymo's technology, including with Daimler AG, Nissan-Renault, Stellantis, Jaguar Land Rover, and Volvo.[11]

History[]

See also: History of self-driving cars

Ground work[]

Google's development of self-driving technology began on January 17, 2009,[12] at the company's secretive Google X lab run by co-founder Sergey Brin.[13] The project was launched by Sebastian Thrun, the former director of the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (SAIL) and Anthony Levandowski, founder of 510 Systems and Anthony's Robots.[14][15]

Before working at Google, Thrun and 15 engineers, including Dmitri Dolgov, Anthony Levandowski, and Mike Montemerlo worked together on a digital mapping technology project for SAIL called VueTool.[16] Many of the team members had met at the 2005 DARPA Grand Challenge where both Thrun and Levandowski had teams competing in the robotic, self-driving car challenge.[17][18] In 2007, Google acqui-hired the entire VueTool team to help advance Google's Street View technology.[16][17][19][20]

As part of Street View's development, 100 Toyota Priuses were purchased[15] and outfitted with the Topcon box, digital mapping hardware developed by Levandowski's company 510 Systems.[21][17][15]

In 2008, the Street View team launched project Ground Truth,[22] to create accurate road maps by extracting data from satellites and street views. This laid the groundwork for the Google's self-driving car program.[23]

Pribot[]

In February 2008, a Discovery Channel producer for the documentary series Prototype This! called Levandowski.[17][24] The producer requested to borrow Levandowski's Ghost Rider, the autonomous two-wheeled motocycle Levandowski's Berkeley team had built for the 2004 DARPA Grand Challenge.[25] However, in 2007, Levandowski had donated the self-driving bike to the Smithsonian.[26] Since the motorcycle was not available, Levandowski offered to retrofit a Toyota Prius as a self-driving pizza delivery car for the show.[17]

As a Google employee, Levandowski asked Larry Page and Sebastian Thrun, if Google was interested in participating in the show. Both declined, citing liability issues.[25] However, they authorized Levandowski to move forward with building the car, given it was clear that it was not associated with Google.[17][27] Within weeks Levandowski founded Anthony's Robots so that he and his team could modify a Toyota Prius without reference to Google.[16] He retrofitted the car with light detection and ranging technology (LiDAR), sensors, cameras, and software from his company 510 Systems and named the prototype, the Pribot.[25] The Pribot was the first self-driving car to drive on public roads.[14] The episode featuring Pribot driving itself and the pizza across the San Francisco Bay Bridge under police escort aired in December 2008.[28][14][27][29]

After the broad press coverage of the Pribot, Levandowski and Thrun were greenlit to launch Google's self-driving car program in January 2009.[25] In 2011, Google quietly acquired Levandowski's technology - the nucleus of Google's self-driving car project,[25] via his two companies, 510 Systems, co-founded alongside Pierre-Yves Droz and Andrew Schultz, and Anthony's Robots for an estimated $20 million.[21][16][28][14][30]

A Firefly self-driving Waymo car

Project Chauffeur[]

Project Chauffeur ran for almost two years undetected, road testing with seven vehicles before the New York Times revealed their existence on October 9, 2010.[18] Google announced its self-driving car initiative via its blog later the same day.[19][31]

Starting in 2010, lawmakers in various states expressed concerns over how to regulate the emerging technology. Nevada passed a law in June 2011 concerning the operation of autonomous cars in Nevada,[32] which went into effect on March 1, 2012.[33] Google had been lobbying for driverless car laws.[32][34][35] A Toyota Prius modified with Google's experimental driverless technology was licensed by the Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) in May 2012.[36] The car was "driven" by Chris Urmson with Anthony Levandowski in the passengers seat.[36] This was the first license issued in the United States for a self-driven car.[33]

In late May 2014, Google revealed a new prototype of its driverless car, which had no steering wheel, gas pedal, or brake pedal, being 100% autonomous.[37][38] In December, they unveiled a fully functioning prototype that they planned to test on San Francisco Bay Area roads beginning in early 2015.[39] Called the Firefly, the car was intended to serve as a platform for experimentation and learning, not mass production.[40]

In 2015, co-founder Anthony Levandowski left the project. In August 2015, Google hired former Hyundai Motor executive, John Krafcik, as CEO.[41] In fall 2015, Google provided "the world's first fully driverless ride on public roads" to a legally blind friend of principal engineer Nathaniel Fairfield.[42] The ride was taken by Steve Mahan, former CEO of the Santa Clara Valley Blind Center, in Austin, Texas. It was the first entirely driverless drive on a public road. It was not accompanied by a test driver or police escort.[43] The car had no steering wheel or floor pedals.[44] By the end of 2015, Project Chauffeur had driven more than a million self-driven miles.[21]

Waymo[]

In December 2016, the project was renamed Waymo and became a new start-up company that is part of Alphabet.[45] The name Waymo was derived from its mission, "a new way forward in mobility."[46] Waymo underwent further test on its cars on public roads after its separation from Google.[47]

In 2017, Waymo sued Uber for allegedly stealing trade secrets.[20] A court document revealed Google had spent $1.1 billion on the project between 2009 and 2015. For comparison, the acquisition of Cruise Automation by General Motors in March 2016 was reported at just over $500 million, and Uber's acquisition of Otto in August 2016 was for $680 million.[48]

Waymo began testing autonomous minivans without a safety driver on public roads in Chandler, Arizona, in October 2017.[49]

In April 2019, Waymo announced plans for vehicle assembly in Detroit at the former American Axle & Manufacturing plant, bringing between 100 and 400 jobs to the area. Waymo will use vehicle assembler Magna to turn Jaguar I-PACE and Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid minivans into Waymo Level 4 autonomous vehicles.[50][51] Waymo subsequently decided to continue retrofitting existing car models rather than manufacturing a new design like the Firefly.[52]

In March 2020, the Alphabet unit formally launched Waymo Via after announcing that it has raised $2.25 billion from a group of investors.[53] In May 2020, Waymo raised an additional $750 million, bringing their total outside investment to $3 billion.[10] In July 2020, the company announced an exclusive partnership with auto manufacturer Volvo to integrate Waymo's self-driving technology into Volvo's vehicles.[54][55]

In April 2021, John Krafcik stepped down as CEO and was replaced by two co-CEOs: Waymo's COO Tekedra Mawakana and CTO Dmitri Dolgov.[56] Waymo raised $2.5 billion in a second funding round in June 2021.[57][58]

Technology[]

A self-driving car with the previous Google branding
A Lexus RX450h retrofitted by Google for its self-driving car project

In 2017, Waymo unveiled new sensors and chips that are less expensive to manufacture, cameras that improve visibility, and wipers to clear the lidar system.[59] Waymo manufactures a suite of self-driving hardware developed in-house.[60] These sensors and hardware-enhanced vision system, improved radar, and laser-based lidar—reduce Waymo's dependence on suppliers.[47][60] The in-house production system allows Waymo to integrate its technology to the hardware efficiently.[61] At the beginning of the self-driving car program, the company spent $75,000 for each lidar system from Velodyne.[61] In 2017, the cost decreased approximately 90 percent, with Waymo designing its own version of lidar.[62]

Waymo officials said the cars the company uses are built for full autonomy with sensors that give 360-degree views and lasers that detect objects up to 300 meters away.[47] Short-range lasers detect and focus on objects near the vehicle, while radar is used to see around vehicles and track objects in motion.[47] The interior of these cars includes buttons for riders to control certain functions: "help," "lock," "pull over," and "start ride."[63]

Waymo engineers have also created a program called Carcraft, a virtual world where Waymo can simulate driving conditions.[64][65] The simulator was named after the video game World of Warcraft.[64][65] With Carcraft, 25,000 virtual self-driving cars navigate through models of Austin, Texas, Mountain View, California, Phoenix, Arizona, and other cities.[64] As of 2018, Waymo has driven more than 5 billion miles in the virtual world.[66]

Waymo has created partnerships with Stellantis,[47] Daimler AG,[67] Lyft,[47] AutoNation,[68] Avis,[47] Intel,[69] Jaguar Land Rover,[70] and Volvo.[54]

The Waymo project team has equipped various types of cars with the self-driving equipment, including the Toyota Prius, Audi TT, Fiat Chrysler Pacifica, and Lexus RX450h.[71][72] Google also developed a custom vehicle, approximately 100 of which were assembled by Roush Enterprises with equipment from Bosch, ZF Lenksysteme, LG, and Continental.[73][74]

In May 2016, Google and Stellantis announced an order of 100 Chrysler Pacifica hybrid minivans to test the self-driving technology.[75] Waymo ordered an additional 500 Pacifica hybrids in 2017, and in late May 2018, Alphabet announced plans to add up to 62,000 Pacifica Hybrid minivans to the fleet.[76][77] In March 2018, Jaguar Land Rover announced that Waymo had ordered up to 20,000 of its planned electric I-Pace cars at an estimated cost of more than $1 billion.[78][79] Jaguar is to deliver the first I-Pace prototype later in the year, and the cars are to become part of Waymo's ride-hailing service in 2020.[80][81][82]

Waymo partnered with Intel to use Intel technologies, such as processors, inside Waymo vehicles.[83] It has deals with Avis and AutoNation for vehicle maintenance.[68] With Lyft, Waymo is partnering on pilot projects and product development.[84]

Road testing[]

A Toyota Prius modified to operate as a Google driverless car, navigating a test course[85]

By 2018, Waymo had tested its system in six states and 25 cities across the U.S over a span of nine years.[76][78] In 2009, Google began testing its self-driving cars in the San Francisco Bay Area.[86] Google's vehicles have traversed San Francisco's Lombard Street, famed for its steep hairpin turns, and through city traffic. The cars have driven over the Golden Gate Bridge and around Lake Tahoe.[19] The system operates at the speed limit it has stored on its maps and maintains its distance from other vehicles using its system of sensors.[87]

By December 2013, four U.S. states had passed laws permitting autonomous cars: Nevada, Florida, California, and Michigan.[88] A law proposed in Texas would also allow testing of, "autonomous motor vehicles".[89][90]

In April 2014, the team announced that their vehicles had logged nearly 700,000 autonomous miles (1.1 million km).[91] In June 2015, the team announced that their vehicles had driven over 1,000,000 mi (1,600,000 km), stating that this was "the equivalent of 75 years of typical U.S. adult driving", and that in the process they had encountered 200,000 stop signs, 600,000 traffic lights, and 180 million other vehicles.[92] Google also announced its prototype vehicles were being road tested in Mountain View, California.[93] During testing, the prototypes' speed did not exceed 25 mph (40 km/h) and had safety drivers aboard. As a consequence, one of the vehicles was stopped by police for impeding traffic flow.[94]

In 2015, Google expanded its road-testing to Texas, where regulations did not prohibit cars without pedals and a steering wheel.[95] Bills were introduced by interested parties to similarly change the legislation in California.[96]

Google took its first driverless ride on public roads in October 2015, when Mahan took a 10-minute solo ride around Austin in a Google "pod car" with no steering wheel or pedals.[97] In 2016, the company expanded its road testing to the dry Phoenix, Arizona, area, and Kirkland, Washington, which has a wet climate.[98] In May 2016, the company opened a 53,000 square foot self-driving technology development center in Novi, Michigan.[99] As of June 2016, Google had test driven its fleet of vehicles, in autonomous mode, a total of 1,725,911 mi (2,777,585 km).[100] In August 2016 alone, their cars traveled a "total of 170,000 miles; of those, 126,000 miles were autonomous (i.e., the car was fully in control)".[101] Beginning of 2017, Waymo reported to California DMV a total of 636,868 miles covered by the fleet in autonomous mode, and the associated 124 disengagements, for the period from December 1, 2015, through November 30, 2016.[102]

In November 2017, Waymo altered its Arizona testing by removing safety drivers in the driver position from their autonomous Chrysler Pacificas.[47] The cars were geofenced within a 100 square mile region surrounding Chandler, Arizona.[47] Waymo's early rider program members were the first to take rides using the new technology.[47]

Waymo began testing its level 4 autonomous cars in Arizona for several reasons: good weather, simple roads, and lax autonomous vehicle laws.[47] Users hail vehicles through the Waymo app. They also have access to an onboard support system that can connect riders to a Waymo agent.[103] In 2017, Waymo began weather testing in Michigan.[63] Also, in 2017, Waymo unveiled its test facility, Castle, on 91 acres in Central Valley, California. Castle, a former airbase, has served as the project's training course since 2012.[47]

According to a Waymo report, as of March 2018, Waymo's self-driving technology had driven more than 5 million miles on public roads and more than 5 billion miles via simulation.[66] Waymo's 25,000 virtual self-driving cars travel 8 million miles per day.[64] By October 2018, Waymo had completed 10 million miles of driving on public roads and over 7 billion simulation miles, and by January 2020, 20 million miles of driving on public roads had been completed.[104][105]

In March 2018, Waymo announced its plans to build additional real-world self-driving experiments with the company's self-driving trucks delivering for sister company Google's data centers located in Atlanta, Georgia.[106]

As of September 12, 2018, Waymo was waiting for permits to test the cars in California, hoping to test in Los Altos, Mountain View, Palo Alto, and Sunnyvale.[107] On October 30, 2018, the California Department of Motor Vehicles issued a permit for Waymo to operate fully driverless cars (i.e., cars without human safety drivers). Waymo was the first company to receive a permit, that allows day and night testing on public roads and highways in California. In a blog post, Waymo announced that its fully driverless cars would be restricted to Mountain View, Sunnyvale, Los Altos, and Palo Alto — all communities close to parent company Alphabet's headquarters (Googleplex).[108][109] In July 2019, Waymo was permitted by California regulators to transport passengers in its vehicles.[110]

In December 2018, Waymo launched the commercial self-driving car service called "Waymo One", allowing users in the Phoenix metropolitan area to use an app and request a pick-up. The service uses safety backup drivers who monitor the rides, with a smaller percentage of rides being provided in select areas by fully driverless vehicles. In November 2019, Waymo One was the first autonomous service worldwide operating without any safety drivers in the car.[2][3][4] The service was paused in March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with a limited service restarted in June 2020.[111] In September 2020, Waymo announced it had partnered with fellow Alphabet company Verily to provide COVID-19 testing to its front-line employees and partners.[112]

In 2021, Waymo expanded testing of Waymo One to San Francisco. In February 2021 the company started limited rider testing in San Francisco with Waymo employee volunteers. In August 2021 commercial Waymo One test service started in the city, beginning with a "trusted tester" rollout.[113]

Crashes[]

In June 2015, Google confirmed the occurrence of 12 collisions.[114] By July 2015, Google's 23 self-driving cars have been involved in 14 minor collisions on public roads.[115] On February 14, 2016, while creeping forward to a stoplight, a Google self-driving car attempted to avoid sandbags blocking its path. During the maneuver, it struck the side of a bus. Google addressed the crash, saying, "In this case, we clearly bear some responsibility because if our car hadn't moved there wouldn't have been a collision."[116][117] Some incomplete video footage of the crash is available.[118] Google characterized the crash as a misunderstanding and a learning experience.[119] The company also stated, "This type of misunderstanding happens between human drivers on the road every day."[120] Google maintained that, in all cases other than the February 2016 incident, the vehicle itself was not at fault because the cars were either being manually driven or the driver of another vehicle was at fault.[121][122][123]

Google initially maintained monthly reports that include any traffic incidents that its self-driving cars had been involved in.[124] Waymo now publishes its own safety reports.[125]

Waymo and other companies are required by the California DMV to report the number of incidents during testing where the human driver took control for safety reasons. Some of these incidents were not reported by Google when simulations indicated the car would have stopped on its own. There is some controversy concerning this distinction between driver-initiated disengagements that Google reports and those that it does not report.[126]

Limitations[]

Waymo operates in some of its testing markets, such as Chandler, Arizona, at level 4 autonomy with no one sitting behind the steering wheel, sharing roadways with other drivers and pedestrians.[47][103] However, more testing is needed. Waymo's earlier testing has focused on areas without harsh weather, extreme density, or complicated road systems, but it has moved on to test under new conditions.[66][97] As a result, Waymo has begun testing in areas with harsher conditions, such as its winter testing in Michigan.[63]

In 2014, a critic wrote in the MIT Technology Review that unmapped stopped lights would cause problems with Waymo's technology and the self-driving technology could not detect potholes. Additionally, the lidar technology cannot spot some potholes or discern when humans, such as a police officers, signal the car to stop, the critic wrote.[127] Waymo has worked to improve how its technology responds in construction zones.[128][129]

Commercialization[]

In 2012, Brin stated that Google Self-Driving cars would be available for the general public in 2017.[130] In 2014, this schedule was updated by project director Chris Urmson to indicate a possible release from 2017 to 2020.[131]

In December 2016, Waymo CEO John Krafcik stated in a blog post, "We can see our technology being useful in personal vehicles, ridesharing, logistics, or solving last mile problems for public transport. Our next step as Waymo will be to let people use our vehicles to do everyday things like run errands, commute to work, or get safely home after a night on the town." Temporary use of vehicles is known as Transportation as a Service (TaaS).[132]

Waymo highlighted four specific business uses for its autonomous tech in 2017: Ridesharing, users can hail cars equipped with Waymo technology via transportation network company apps; trucking and logistics, urban last-mile solutions for public transportation, and passenger cars.[63] In 2017, Waymo was also considering licensing autonomous technology to vehicle manufacturers.[97][133]

In May 2018, Waymo established a subsidiary in Shanghai, Huimo Business Consulting, with $441,000 of funding.[134]

In April 2021, new co-CEOs Dmitri Dolgov and Tekedra Mawakana of Waymo emphasised that Alphabet’s self-driving powerhouse always stick to a safety-conscious roadmap to robotic ride-hailing, trucks and personal vehicles, even though it cost longer time to commercialization, in their first joint interview. [135]

Robo-taxis[]

In August 2013, news reports surfaced about Robo-Taxi, a proposed driverless vehicle taxicab service from Google.[136] These reports re-appeared again in early 2014,[137] following the granting of a patent to Google for an advertising fee funded transportation service which included autonomous vehicles as a transport method.[138] Google consultant Larry Burns says self-driving, taxi-like vehicles "should be viewed as a new form of public transportation".[129]

In April 2017, Waymo launched an early rider program in Phoenix, Arizona, which signed up 400 users to try out a test edition of Waymo's transportation service. Over the next year, 400 riders used the Waymo service, providing feedback.[139] In May 2018, Waymo announced that it plans to allow everyone in Phoenix to request a driverless ride before the end of the year.[140][141] On December 5, 2018, the company launched a commercial self-driving car service called "Waymo One"; users in the Phoenix metropolitan area use an app to request a pick-up.[1] By November 2019, the service was operating autonomous vehicles without a safety backup driver, the first autonomous service worldwide operating without safety drivers in the car.[2][3][4] In 2021, the company started public testing in San Francisco.[113]

Trucking and delivery[]

"Waymo Via" is the trucking division of Waymo, which launched in March 2020.[53][142] Using the same sensors and software as Waymo's other autonomous vehicles, Class 8 tractor-trailers began testing Waymo's self-driving technology in California and Arizona in 2017.[143] In 2018, Waymo launched a pilot program with Google to use autonomous trucks to move freight to its sister company's Atlanta-area data centers.[143] According to a Transport Topics news article, "Waymo does not intend to get into truck manufacturing or shipping services. Instead, it wants to work with OEMs and motor carriers to get its technology into vehicles."[144] In October 2019, CEO John Krafcik stated that Waymo was fleshing out the trucking side of the business, and that self-driving commercial business vehicles might catch on faster than the ride-hailing robotaxi service.[145] In June 2020, Waymo announced its plans to focus testing efforts on southwest shipping routes including, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California.[144] In August 2020 the company added a new trucking hub in Dallas, Texas, to test their fleet of Peterbilt trucks in various commercial settings.[146] In October 2020, Waymo announced a global strategic partnership with Daimler AG to integrate Waymo's driver technology into a fleet of Freightliner Cascadia semi-trailer trucks.[11]

Waymo has also expanded the use of their self-driving technology to commercial delivery vehicles. In January 2020 the company announced a pilot program with United Parcel Service, where Waymo vehicles transfer packages from UPS stores to a UPS sorting facility.[147] This process allows packages at the UPS stores to be moved more rapidly into the UPS delivery system, instead of waiting to pick them up at the end of the day.[148] In July 2020 Waymo and Stellantis announced an expansion of their partnership, including the development of level 4 autonomous Ram ProMaster delivery vehicles.[149]

Waymo LLC v. Uber Technologies, Inc. et al.[]

In February 2017, Waymo sued Uber and its subsidiary self-driving trucking company, Otto, for allegedly stealing trade secrets and patent infringement. The company claimed that three ex-Google employees, including Anthony Levandowski, had stolen trade secrets, including thousands of driverless car technology files from Google, before joining Uber.[150] The infringement is related to Waymo's proprietary lidar technology,[151][152] which could measure the distances between objects using laser and create their three-dimensional representations.[153] Google accused Uber of colluding with Levandowski to obtain information about its lidar and other technologies in its driverless car project.[154] The former Google engineer downloaded 9 gigabytes of data that included over a hundred trade secrets; eight were at stake during the trial.[155][156]

The trial began on February 5, 2018,[157] and was dismissed on February 9, as a settlement was announced with Uber giving Waymo 0.34 percent of Uber's stock,[150] the equivalent of $245 million in Uber equity and agreeing to ensure Uber does not infringe Waymo's intellectual property.[158] Part of the agreement included a guarantee that "Waymo confidential information is not being incorporated in Uber Advanced Technologies Group hardware and software."[159] In released statements after the settlement, Uber maintained that it received no trade secrets.[160] In May, according to the statement from Matt Kallman, an Uber spokesman, Uber had fired Levandowski, which resulted in a loss of roughly $250 million of his own equity in Uber and this value almost exactly equaled to the stock value Uber paid to Waymo LLC.[150]

References[]

  1. ^ Jump up to: a b "Waymo launches its first commercial self-driving car service". Engadget. Retrieved 5 December 2018.
  2. ^ Jump up to: a b c Lee, Timothy (2019-11-02). "Waymo let a reporter ride in a fully driverless car - Waymo has been touting fully driverless operation for almost two years". Ars Technica. Retrieved 2020-08-05.
  3. ^ Jump up to: a b c Hawkins, Andrew (2019-12-09). "Waymo's driverless car: ghost-riding in the back seat of a robot taxi". The Verge. Retrieved 2020-08-05.
  4. ^ Jump up to: a b c Piper, Kelsey (2020-02-28). "It's 2020. Where are our self-driving cars? - In the age of AI advances, self-driving cars turned out to be harder than people expected". Vox (website). Retrieved 2020-09-14.
  5. ^ White, Joseph (2020-10-08). "Waymo opens driverless robo-taxi service to the public in Phoenix". Reuters. Retrieved 2020-10-20.
  6. ^ "Waymo Relaunches Driverless Ride Sharing". All About Arizona News. 2020-10-12. Retrieved 2020-10-18.
  7. ^ "10 Places to Take a Waymo in Chandler, AZ". www.visitchandler.com. February 27, 2020.
  8. ^ Hawkins, Andrew J. (December 9, 2019). "Waymo's driverless car: ghost-riding in the back seat of a robot taxi". The Verge.
  9. ^ "Waymo CEO John Krafcik steps aside as co-CEO's take over". CNBC. Retrieved 2021-04-02.
  10. ^ Jump up to: a b Miller, Daniel (2020-05-13). "Waymo Drives an Additional $750 million in Funding". The Motley Fool. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  11. ^ Jump up to: a b Hawkins, Andrew (2020-10-27). "Waymo and Daimler are teaming up to build fully driverless semi trucks - 'A broad, global, strategic partnership'". The Verge. Retrieved 2020-10-27.
  12. ^ Krafcik, John (17 January 2019). "Our #tenyearchallenge has been building the world's most experienced driver. Thanks to two visionary @Google characters for getting us started & to the @Waymo One riders in #Phoenix we're serving. HBD #Waymo pic.twitter.com/Ew4fdXjM7c". John Krafcik's official Twitter account. Archived from the original on 23 January 2019. Retrieved 17 January 2019.
  13. ^ "Google's self-driving-car project becomes a separate company: Waymo". The Associated Press. 13 December 2016. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  14. ^ Jump up to: a b c d "The Unknown Start-up That Built Google's First Self-Driving Car". IEEE Spectrum: Technology, Engineering, and Science News. Retrieved 2020-07-01. Though Google has portrayed Thrun as its “godfather” of self-driving, a review of the available evidence suggests that the motivating force behind the company’s program was actually Levandowski
  15. ^ Jump up to: a b c "God Is a Bot, and Anthony Levandowski Is His Messenger | Backchannel". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  16. ^ Jump up to: a b c d Higgins, Jack Nicas and Tim (2017-05-23). "Google vs. Uber: How One Engineer Sparked a War". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  17. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e f "Fury Road: Did Uber Steal the Driverless Future From Google?". www.bloomberg.com. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  18. ^ Jump up to: a b John Markoff (October 9, 2010). "Google Cars Drive Themselves, in Traffic". The New York Times. Retrieved October 11, 2010.
  19. ^ Jump up to: a b c Sebastian Thrun (October 9, 2010). "What we're driving at". The Official Google Blog. Retrieved October 11, 2010.
  20. ^ Jump up to: a b Hull, Dana (30 October 2017). "The PayPal Mafia of Self-Driving Cars Has Been at It a Decade". Bloomberg. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  21. ^ Jump up to: a b c Duhigg, Charles. "Did Uber Steal Google's Intellectual Property?". The New Yorker. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  22. ^ Miller, Greg (2014-12-08). "The Huge, Unseen Operation Behind the Accuracy of Google Maps". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  23. ^ https://static1.squarespace.com/static/55a5a07ee4b0d4522cac0322/t/582f48d5f5e23137ed567a3d/1479493848415/GISday16_GoogleMaps.pdf
  24. ^ Bilger, Burkhard. "Has the Self-Driving Car Arrived at Last?". The New Yorker. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  25. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e "How a robot lover pioneered the driverless car, and why he's selling his latest to Uber". the Guardian. 2016-08-19. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  26. ^ ""Ghostrider" Robot Motorcycle". National Museum of American History. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  27. ^ Jump up to: a b McCullagh, Declan. "Robotic Prius takes itself for a spin around SF". CNET. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  28. ^ Jump up to: a b "How Anthony Levandowski Put Himself at the Center of an Industry". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  29. ^ "Automated Pizza Delivery". Discovery. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  30. ^ Ohnsman, Alan. "Anthony Levandowski, The Fallen Self-Driving Tech Star Who Triggered Waymo-Uber Legal Battle, Ordered To Pay Google $179 Million". Forbes. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  31. ^ "Anthony Levandowski pleads guilty to one count of trade secrets theft under plea deal". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2020-06-30.
  32. ^ Jump up to: a b "Nevada enacts law authorizing autonomous (driverless) vehicles". Green Car Congress. June 25, 2011. Retrieved June 25, 2011.
  33. ^ Jump up to: a b Mary Slosson (May 8, 2012). "Google gets first self-driven car license in Nevada". Reuters. Retrieved May 9, 2012.
  34. ^ Alex Knapp (June 22, 2011). "Nevada Passes Law Authorizing Driverless Cars". Forbes. Retrieved June 25, 2011.
  35. ^ John Markoff (May 10, 2011). "Google Lobbies Nevada To Allow Self-Driving Cars". The New York Times. Retrieved May 11, 2011.
  36. ^ Jump up to: a b Harris, Mark. "How Google's Autonomous Car Passed the First U.S. State Self-Driving Test". IEEE Spectrum: Technology, Engineering, and Science News. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  37. ^ A First Drive. YouTube. 27 May 2014.
  38. ^ Liz Gannes. "Google Introduces New Self Driving Car at the Code Conference - Re/code". Re/code.
  39. ^ "Google's 'goofy' new self-driving car a sign of things to come". San Jose Mercury News. Retrieved 2014-12-22.
  40. ^ Lynch, Jim (13 June 2017). "Waymo retires Firefly test cars, focuses on Pacificas". The Detroit News. Retrieved 27 June 2018.
  41. ^ Wakabayashi, Daisuke (2016-12-13). "Google Parent Company Spins Off Self-Driving Car Business". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-06-30.
  42. ^ Team, Waymo (December 13, 2016). "On the road with self-driving car user number one". Medium.
  43. ^ III, Ashley Halsey; Laris, Michael (2016-12-13). "Blind man sets out alone in Google's driverless car". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved 2020-07-02.
  44. ^ Encalada, Debbie (December 14, 2016). "Google Confirms First Ever Driverless Self-Driving Car Ride". Complex Media.
  45. ^ "Journey". Waymo.
  46. ^ Etherington, Darrell; Kolodny, Lora. "Google's self-driving car unit becomes Waymo".
  47. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e f g h i j k l m Andrew J. Hawkins (7 November 2017). "Waymo is first to put fully self-driving cars on US roads without a safety driver". The Verge. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  48. ^ Mark Harris (15 Sep 2017). "Google Has Spent Over $1.1 Billion on Self-Driving Tech". IEEE spectrum.
  49. ^ Randazzo, Ryan (30 January 2018). "Waymo to start driverless ride sharing in Phoenix area this year". Arizona Republic. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  50. ^ Sage, Alexandria (2019-04-23). "Waymo picks Detroit factory for self-driving fleet, to be operational by mid-2019". Reuters. Retrieved 2019-04-23.
  51. ^ Korosec, Kirsten. "Waymo picks Detroit factory to build self-driving cars". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2019-04-23.
  52. ^ Rudgard, Olivia (2019-08-19). "Google spin-out Waymo rules out building its own self-driving cars". The Telegraph. ISSN 0307-1235. Retrieved 2019-08-20.
  53. ^ Jump up to: a b LeBeau, Phil (2020-03-02). "Waymo launches delivery service after raising $2.25 billion". CNBC. Retrieved 2020-03-03.
  54. ^ Jump up to: a b Silver, David. "Waymo And Volvo Form Exclusive Self-Driving Partnership". Forbes. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  55. ^ "Volvo Cars, Waymo partner to build self-driving vehicles". Reuters. 2020-06-25. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  56. ^ Nieva, Richard (April 2, 2021). "Waymo CEO John Krafcik to step down from self-driving car company". CNET. Retrieved April 4, 2021.
  57. ^ Sebastian, Dave (June 16, 2021). "Waymo Raises $2.5 Billion in Funding Round". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved July 13, 2021.
  58. ^ Alamalhodaei, Aria (June 16, 2021). "Waymo, Alphabet's self-driving arm, raises $2.5B in second external investment round". TechCrunch. Retrieved July 13, 2021.
  59. ^ Mark Bergen Alistair Barr (16 May 2017). "Waymo Tests Hardware to Ease Passenger Fears of Driverless Cars". Bloomberg. Retrieved 13 June 2018.CS1 maint: uses authors parameter (link)
  60. ^ Jump up to: a b Gibbs, Samuel (7 November 2017). "Google sibling Waymo launches fully autonomous ride-hailing service". The Guardian. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  61. ^ Jump up to: a b Dallon Adams (26 April 2017). "Everything you need to know about Waymo's self-driving car project". Digital Trends. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  62. ^ Ron Amadeo (9 January 2017). "Google's Waymo invests in LIDAR technology, cuts costs by 90 percent". Ars Technica. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  63. ^ Jump up to: a b c d della Cava, Marco (31 October 2017). "Waymo shows off the secret facility where it trains self-driving cars". USA Today. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  64. ^ Jump up to: a b c d Madrigal, Alexis C. (23 August 2017). "Inside Waymo's Secret World for Training Self-Driving Cars". The Atlantic. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  65. ^ Jump up to: a b Timothy J. Seppala (23 August 2017). "'Carcraft' is Waymo's virtual world for autonomous vehicle testing". Engadget. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  66. ^ Jump up to: a b c Alan Ohnsman (2 March 2018). "Waymo Is Millions Of Miles Ahead In Robot Car Tests; Does It Need A Billion More?". Forbes. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  67. ^ Daimler Trucks partners with Waymo to build self-driving semi trucks, TechCrunch, 27 October 2020
  68. ^ Jump up to: a b Boudette, Neal E. (2 November 2017). "Waymo Enlists AutoNation to Maintain Driverless Test Fleet". The New York Times. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  69. ^ Jordan Novet (18 September 2017). "Google's self-driving cars have been using Intel chips this whole time". CNBC. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  70. ^ Bergen, Mark; Naughton, Keith (2 April 2018). "Waymo isn't going to slow down now". Bloomberg. Retrieved 12 June 2018.
  71. ^ Damon Lavrinc (April 16, 2012). "Exclusive: Google Expands Its Autonomous Fleet With Hybrid Lexus RX450h". Wired. Retrieved April 24, 2012.
  72. ^ Gibbs, Samuel (2017-11-07). "Google sibling Waymo launches fully autonomous ride-hailing service". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2017-12-03.
  73. ^ "Crain's Detroit Business : Subscription Center". crainsdetroit.com.
  74. ^ "Google in talks with OEMs, suppliers to build self-driving cars". Automotive News.
  75. ^ Tommaso Ebhardt (3 May 2016). "Fiat, Google Plan Partnership on Self-Driving Minivans".
  76. ^ Jump up to: a b Andrew J. Hawkins (30 January 2018). "Waymo strikes a deal to buy 'thousands' more self-driving minivans from Fiat Chrysler". The Verge. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  77. ^ della Cava, Marco. "Waymo will add up to 62,000 FCA minivans to self-driving fleet". USA TODAY. Retrieved 1 June 2018.
  78. ^ Jump up to: a b Higgins, Tim; Dawson, Chester (27 March 2018). "Waymo Orders Up to 20,000 Jaguar SUVs for Driverless Fleet". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  79. ^ Topham, Gwyn (2018-03-27). "Jaguar to supply 20,000 cars to Google's self-driving spin-off Waymo". the Guardian. Retrieved 2018-03-28.
  80. ^ "Waymo and Jaguar will build up to 20,000 self-driving electric SUVs". The Verge. Retrieved 2018-03-28.
  81. ^ "Waymo teams up with Jaguar to intro a new, premium self-driving car – TechCrunch". techcrunch.com. Retrieved 2018-03-28.
  82. ^ Tovey, Alan (2018-03-27). "Jaguar Land Rover lands £1.2bn deal to supply self-driving cars to Google's Waymo". The Telegraph. ISSN 0307-1235. Retrieved 2018-03-28.
  83. ^ "Intel is collaborating with Waymo on self-driving car technology". Business Insider. Retrieved 2017-12-12.
  84. ^ Isaac, Mike (14 May 2017). "Lyft and Waymo Reach Deal to Collaborate on Self-Driving Cars". The New York Times. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  85. ^ "The Test Driven Google Car". April 30, 2011. Retrieved November 19, 2012.
  86. ^ Darrell Etherington (12 January 2018). "Waymo's self-driving Chrysler Pacifica begins testing in San Francisco". TechCrunch. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  87. ^ Sheikh, Azzam. "Ultrasonic Sensors on Rear Wheels", national.co.uk, December 14, 2014
  88. ^ Muller, Joann. "With Driverless Cars, Once Again It Is California Leading The Way", Forbes.com, September 26, 2012
  89. ^ "Legislative Session: 83(R) Bill: HB 2932", Texas Legislature Online, May 30, 2013
  90. ^ Whittington, Mark. "Law Proposed in Texas to Require Licensed Driver in Self-Driving Vehicles", Yahoo! News, Fri, March 8, 2013
  91. ^ The latest chapter for the self-driving car: mastering city street driving, googleblog
  92. ^ "Sign in - Google Accounts". accounts.google.com.
  93. ^ Murphy, Mike. "Google's self-driving cars are now on the streets of California", Quartz, June 25, 2015
  94. ^ Smith, Alexander; Hansen, Shelby (November 13, 2015). "Google Self-Driving Car Gets Pulled Over — For Going Too Slowly". NBCNews.com. NBC News. Retrieved November 13, 2015. A Google self-driving car was pulled over by police because the vehicle was traveling too slowly, officials said. The officer in Mountain View, California, noticed traffic backing up behind the prototype vehicle, which was traveling 24 mph in a 35 mph zone, the force said.
  95. ^ "California's Red Tape Slows Google's Self-Driving Roll". www.yahoo.com. Retrieved 2015-11-16.
  96. ^ Harris, Mark (25 March 2016). "California lawmaker pushes for driver-free robot car testing on public roads" – via The Guardian.
  97. ^ Jump up to: a b c Davies, Lex (7 November 2017). "Wymo has taken the human out of its self-driving cars". Wired. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  98. ^ David Shepardson (7 April 2016). "Google expanding self-driving vehicle testing to Phoenix, Arizona". TechCrunch. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  99. ^ Krafcik, John (2017-10-27). "Michigan is Waymo's winter wonderland". Medium.com. Retrieved 2018-09-15.
  100. ^ "Google Self-Driving Car Project Monthly Report - June 2016" (PDF). Retrieved 15 July 2016.
  101. ^ "Google Self-Driving Car Project Monthly Report August 2016" (PDF).
  102. ^ Autonomous Vehicle Disengagement Reports 2016
  103. ^ Jump up to: a b Darrell Etherington (7 November 2017). "Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel". TechCrunch. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  104. ^ Team, Waymo (2018-10-10). "Where the next 10 million miles will take us". Waymo. Retrieved 2018-11-01.
  105. ^ Lee, Timothy (2020-01-07). "Waymo is way, way ahead on testing miles - that might not be a good thing". Ars Technica. Retrieved 2020-07-22.
  106. ^ "Waymo's self-driving trucks will start delivering freight in Atlanta". The Verge. Retrieved 2018-03-09.
  107. ^ Megan V. Winslow (September 12, 2018). "Awaiting approval of permits, Waymo holds forum in Los Altos Hills". Los Altos Town Crier. Retrieved September 12, 2018.
  108. ^ "Waymo gets the green light to test fully driverless cars in California". The Verge. Retrieved 2018-11-01.
  109. ^ Team, Waymo (2018-10-30). "A Green Light for Waymo's Driverless Testing in California". Medium. Retrieved 2018-11-01.
  110. ^ "Waymo is now allowed to transport passengers in its self-driving vehicles on California roads". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2019-09-25.
  111. ^ Hawkins, Andrew (2020-05-20). "Waymo's robot minivans are ready to roll in the Bay Area for the first time since COVID-19 outbreak - The AV company is the latest to discover that doing deliveries can help sidestep restrictions on nonessential travel". The Verge. Retrieved 2020-09-13.
  112. ^ "Providing COVID-19 testing to our team in partnership with Verily". 2020-09-04. Retrieved 2020-09-14.
  113. ^ Jump up to: a b Amadeo, Ron (2021-08-25). "Waymo expands to San Francisco with public self-driving test - Confidential testing starts in SF, featuring Waymo's 5th-gen Jaguar I-Pace cars". Ars Technica. Retrieved 2021-08-26.
  114. ^ "Google founder defends accident records of self-driving cars". Los Angeles Times. Associated Press. 2015-06-03. Retrieved 2016-07-01.
  115. ^ Charlie Osborne. "Google's autonomous car injuries: Blame the human".
  116. ^ Davies, Alex. "Google's Self-Driving Car Caused Its First Crash".
  117. ^ Serna, Joseph. "Passenger bus teaches Google robot car a lesson".
  118. ^ "Google self-driving car caught on video colliding with bus". Associated Press. 9 March 2016 – via The Guardian.
  119. ^ "For the first time, Google's self-driving car takes some blame for a crash".
  120. ^ "The Google car crash was 'not a surprise', US transport secretary says". 14 March 2016.
  121. ^ Urmson, Chris. "The View from the Front Seat of the Google Self-Driving Car". Medium.
  122. ^ JOHN MARKOFF (October 9, 2010). "Google Cars Drive Themselves, in Traffic". The New York Times. Retrieved August 12, 2012.
  123. ^ "Human Driver Crashes Google's Self Driving Car". businessinsider.com. August 5, 2011. Retrieved May 4, 2013.
  124. ^ Steve Kovach (18 January 2017). "Google quietly stopped publishing monthly accident reports for its self driving cars". Business Insider. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  125. ^ Laris, Michael (23 October 2017). "Waymo gives federal officials a detailed safety report on self-driving vehicles". The Washington Post. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  126. ^ Harris, Mark (12 January 2016). "Google reports self-driving car mistakes: 272 failures and 13 near misses" – via The Guardian.
  127. ^ Lee Gomes (August 28, 2014). "Hidden Obstacles for Google's Self-driving Car".
  128. ^ Alex Castro (9 May 2018). "Inside Waymo's strategy to grow the best brains for self-driving cars". The Verge. Retrieved 3 July 2018.
  129. ^ Jump up to: a b Eric Jaffe (28 April 2014). "The first look at how Google's self-driving car handles city streets". CityLab. Retrieved 3 July 2018.
  130. ^ Donna Tam (September 25, 2012). "Google's Sergey Brin: You'll ride in robot cars within 5 years". cnet.com. Retrieved October 20, 2014.
  131. ^ Liz Gannes (May 13, 2014). "Here's What It's Like to Go for a Ride in Google's Robot Car". recode.net. Retrieved October 20, 2014.
  132. ^ Krafcik, John (13 December 2016). "Say hello to Waymo: what's next for Google's self-driving car project – Waymo".
  133. ^ Johana Bhuiyan (27 March 2018). "Alphabet will operate a fleet of 20,000 Jaguar cars for its driverless ride-hail service by 2022". Recode. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  134. ^ Bergen, Mark; Spears, Lee (2018-08-24). "Waymo's Shanghai Subsidiary Gives Alphabet Another Route Back to China". Bloomberg. Retrieved 2018-08-24.
  135. ^ Ohnsman, Alan. "Amid Tesla Crash Concerns Waymo's New Co-CEOs Say No Shortcuts To Safe Autonomy". Forbes. Retrieved 2021-06-14.
  136. ^ Michelle Fitzsimmons (August 24, 2013). "Google may be crafting its own self-driving cars, tinkering with robo-taxis". techradar.com. Retrieved August 25, 2013.
  137. ^ Billy Davies (January 24, 2014). "The future of urban transport: The self-driving car club". zodiacmedia.co.uk. Retrieved January 24, 2014.
  138. ^ B1 US patent 8630897 B1, Luis Ricardo Prada Gomez; Andrew Timothy Szybalski Sebastian Thrun & Philip Nemec et al., "Transportation-aware physical advertising conversions", published 2014-01-14, assigned to Google Inc 
  139. ^ Team, Waymo (March 21, 2019). "Waymo's early rider program, one year in". Medium.
  140. ^ ExpovistaTV (2018-05-08), Google i/O 2018: Waymo's Self-Driving Cars Hit The Public Roads., retrieved 2018-05-10
  141. ^ "Waymo's self-driving car service is launching in Phoenix later this year". VentureBeat. 2018-05-08. Retrieved 2018-05-10.
  142. ^ "Waymo Via - Same Driver. Different Vehicle". Retrieved 2020-07-22.
  143. ^ Jump up to: a b Andrew J. Hawkins (9 March 2018). "Waymo's self-driving trucks will start delivering freight in Atlanta". The Verge. Retrieved 27 June 2018.
  144. ^ Jump up to: a b "Waymo Targets Southwest Freight Corridor for Autonomous Truck Tests". Transport Topics. 2020-06-30. Retrieved 2020-07-02.
  145. ^ Naughton, Keith (2019-10-28). "Waymo CEO Sees Driverless Trucking Catching on Faster Than Taxis". Bloomberg News. Retrieved 2020-07-22.
  146. ^ Ohnsman, Alan (2020-08-25). "Waymo Taps Texas As Its Robot Truck Hub With Dallas Depot". Forbes. Retrieved 2020-09-14.
  147. ^ McFarland, Matt (2020-01-29). "UPS teams up with Waymo to test self-driving delivery vans". CNN. Retrieved 2020-07-22.
  148. ^ "How the Waymo Driver is revolutionizing shipping - It's not only more efficient. Delivery networks, energy conservation, warehouse design, and more will all be affected—for the better". Fast Company. 2020-07-28. Retrieved 2020-07-29.
  149. ^ Gitlin, Jonathan (2020-07-22). "Waymo is working on autonomous Ram ProMaster Vans for goods deliveries - FCA was Waymo's first OEM partner in 2016, deal will continue post-merger with PSA". Ars Technica. Retrieved 2020-07-22.
  150. ^ Jump up to: a b c Wakabayashi, Daisuke (2018-02-09). "Uber and Waymo Settle Trade Secrets Suit Over Driverless Cars". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2019-02-23.
  151. ^ "Waymo LLC v. Uber Technologies, Inc; Ottomotto LLC; Otto Trucking LLC". Trade Secrets Institute. Retrieved 2017-03-18.
  152. ^ "Waymo's Complaint Against Uber". The New York Times. 2017-02-23. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2017-03-18.
  153. ^ Larson, Selena. "Uber and Waymo settle trade secrets lawsuit". CNNMoney. Retrieved 2018-06-04.
  154. ^ "Secrets or Knowledge? Uber-Waymo Trial Tests Silicon Valley Culture". The New York Times. 2018-01-30. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2018-06-04.
  155. ^ "I'm not so sure Waymo's going to win against Uber". The Verge. Retrieved 2018-06-04.
  156. ^ Selena Larson (7 February 2018). "The tech at the center of the Waymo vs. Uber trade secrets case". CNN. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  157. ^ Farivar, Cyrus (5 February 2018). "Waymo: "We're bringing this case because Uber is cheating"". Ars Technica. Retrieved 9 February 2018.
  158. ^ Farivar, Cyrus (9 February 2018). "Silicon Valley's most-watched trial ends as Waymo and Uber settle". Ars Technica. Retrieved 9 February 2018.
  159. ^ Larson, 2018.
  160. ^ Lien, Russ Mitchell, Tracey. "Uber reaches settlement with Waymo in dispute over trade secrets". latimes.com. Retrieved 2018-06-04.

Further reading[]

External links[]

Retrieved from ""