Instead of trying for universal self driving, they're going to prioritise being self driving taxi's for the most profitable areas.
Makes sense. Ten cities are most of the US taxi market.[1] New York City alone is about a third. New York will be tough in several directions, but Waymo will probably succeed there eventually. Meanwhile, they can just scale up in LA.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxis_of_the_United_States
I don't think from either a business, technical or legal perspective google ever wants to sell or license their tech directly to a car being sold to the public.
They want to run a taxi service, they plan on running a taxi service, they're never going to sell it directly to consumers but they don't want consumers thinking about the implications of that.
They're just going to keep expanding Waymo in the background till it's ubiquitous.
I, and many others, are past the point of trusting their words.
thats just a function of the numbers of cars on the road
What they may do is refuse to raise prices and eventually inflation will make them the cheapest.
The cost of a Waymo car right now is around $150K. Soon, Waymo will build its own cars (with partnership with some car manufacturer) from scratch which will bring this cost to around $40K.
currently WayMo has around 2 people per car employed in service roles which will be like 2 people per 50 cars. At that point they will be swimming in profits.
Do you have a source for this? I'm curious about their operations
The problem with this is that one of their competitors (Tesla) now has very powerful friends in the government which are certainly not above using that power in their favor...
They'll perpetually be in "beta" until they're so ubiquitous that the idea of getting rid of them is unthinkable.
[1] https://techcrunch.com/2025/01/28/waymo-is-reportedly-buildi...
Take this with the grain of salt it deserves. No one relying solely on publicly available information can give you anything more than highly speculative guesses.
And the prices seems to roughly match Uber/Lyft. Sometimes they're higher sometimes lower. The one ride I took I chose the more expensive Waymo just for the better experience. You don't have to worry about what the driver might say or do that makes you uncomfortable or unsafe.
They aren't aggressive like a normal driver when traffic is stopped and there's a clear but small gap that would result in the car being at an angle crossing traffic.
The lidar can't see any gap between cars when trying to turn into a more distant lane, so any obstruction to a close lane due to traffic kills them.
Source: been stuck in and observed Waymo in this situation for 10+ minutes several times.
A human driver is willing to make the turn much sooner.
Don't take a Waymo if you're in a hurry and the route will have such a left turns.
The light had just turned yellow before we entered the intersection, and I was sure it would slam the brakes (there was no one behind, so no risk of being read-ended). Yet it accelerated and cleared the intersection as the light turned red. It was what any reasonably good driver would do, but certainly edgy for a 100% law-abiding robot.
Pretty flawless experience.
That particular one was a traffic light green light with a "do not queue over intersection" area specifically designed to allow cars in my lane to turn onto the main road. The Waymo can't see that there's a gap in the lane it wanted to turn into, and was too conservative about queuing over the intersection at an angle when the light was green like any human would do.
Even if they're sometimes slower in pickup or trip time, on average, I greatly value the consistency of the experience over everything else.
I take both waymo's and lyft/uber all the time in sf and waymo's are way slower. I'd estimate it at 10-15% slower. Once the novelty of a waymo wears off you realize that they drive like a high anxiety teenager and going 15 mph on a 15 mph road, coming to gentle full stop at every stop sign, and being very tentative on turns and passing people all add up to a very slow ride.
You're right though it definitely feels safer.
They are doing the right thing.
"Lawful to a fault teenager" is not what people want in a taxi driver. That type of chauffeur doesn't make people feel safe. It makes them on edge. But unfortunately that's the kind of AI chauffeur regulators want.
I agree it's the "right" way to do it from a PR perspective though.
A Waymo drives more like a 50 year old who's seen some shit and drives well but defensively.
Uber drivers cause accidents sometimes, just like all drivers do. Whenever this happens, we generally blame the driver and not Uber. It's a completely unremarkable event that the media will not pick up on, because everybody knows that car accidents are just a fact of life.
If a Waymo causes just one fatal accident, people will be up in arms and demand a ban on self driving. That means they have to be extremely conservative in how they drive, especially as more and more of them appear and the probability of one causing an accident goes up due to simple statistics.
Human drivers are all different. They also learn from their mistakes and change unpredictably over time. Humans can get away with all kinds of unsafe behavior, because bad outcomes are unlikely in any particular situation. If something bad happens, it could easily be a one-off issue. And even with systemic issues, it's easier to change the environment / regulations / vehicles than the drivers.
Kidding but not kidding. Easily half my Uber rides have been legit scary. Yellow cabs only slightly better.
How does Waymo do for cleanliness and odor? That would be another selling point vs regular Uber/Lyft and many yellow cabs. These days they all seem to douse the interior with cheap cologne.
Also, don’t you think it’s weird that you complain that the car goes 15 on a road with speed limit equal to 15?
I like that Waymo has human backup! Knowing that if the car gets into a tricky situation there's someone who can remote control it back out again is very reassuring.
I also like not having to think about where it parks, what it's doing when I'm not in it etc.
I get where I'm going and I send it over the the parking garage a mile away that's cheap, and then summon it back when I'm done with my event, so I never have to circle for parking. If enough people to it, they would probably develop a protocol so that they can be parked at a lot that is super dense and it's a puzzle to get the cars in and out.
And they could still be sold with remote human backup services (as well as giving you the owner the ability to take over if you want to).
I could also send it on errands. Go to Target and pick up my curbside order. Go to the pizza place and have them drop it on the front seat. Pick up my kid from school and bring her home. Go pick up my mother in law and bring her to my house so I don't have to go get her!
And I could use it to drive me to my parents house 350 miles away while I sleep.
I can think of a million reasons I'd want one.
Most people don't want that and there's no market for it. Consumers (rightly) expect a vehicle that just works. It's still early days for this technology and building something that works as reliably/independently as the rest of a car isn't possible yet.
Sure, and the cost would be really high too, but for a very wealthy person it might be worth it.
> would you be willing to check the air pressure regularly
I have to do that on my regular car, but it only needs air once every six months or so. New tires are pretty good about holding air. Also, no different than a regular car.
> take the vehicle in for calibration
I already have sensors on my car that require calibration, and I do that when it goes in for maintenance, about once a year. I wonder if these sensors need calibration more often.
> clean the sensors
You mean, wash the car? :)
> do software updates, implement the legal reporting responsibilities, etc?
I assume that would all be automatic over the air. And again, we're talking about someone who could afford a $150K car. There is a good chance they could hire someone to do that stuff too.
I'm picturing herds of empty Model 3's endlessly circling every city's downtown office district
In the distant future (10 years?) we may have private trailers/pods that are moved by self-driving vehicles. Best of both options.
In self driving world it no longer makes sense for a car to look like they do now.
Instead I think they operate a bit like Coach and Horses used to. You the consumer own the "coach", you have it specced out how you want it, your choice of seating (hell even a bed?), your sound system, your big screen tv, whatever you want because you're a passenger not the driver.
The "horses" are the self driving bit + batteries. The ubiquitous taxi service owns these. Maybe you permanently rent a low range model (100 miles) that is attached to your "Coach" at all times for quick errands. For longer range journeys you hire a model with more battery and longer range that drives over and attaches automatically to your coach.
For really long range journeys, your self driving "horse" drives into a coaching station along the way, detaches and another one attaches in 30 seconds and off you go.
I think it might go this way because people feel like they want to "own" their "cars". Especially in America it's a big part of the culture, so I can see being able to buy the coach part as being a popular compromise.
Powering electric cars is already cheaper, but right now they're less convenient, with self driving they become as convenient or more than gas vehicles. You no longer have to stop and charge anywhere because there's a fresh "horse" waiting to be hooked up while your existing one drives off to a charging station, all the downsides are automated away.