It’s with noting this research is a collaboration between Swiss Re and Waymo. That doesn’t invalidate the research necessarily, but warrants more skepticism than if it were an independent research by Swiss Re, like the article implies.
How would Swiss Re get the data except by collaborating with Waymo?
Any sharing of information or data could be construed as a collaboration, but this seems to go beyond that, as the research paper includes multiple Waymo employees as coauthors.
It can be both "collaboration" and "independent". What makes you think these are mutually exclusive?
those words are the literal antithesis of eachother