General Motors (GM) announced this week it’s putting the brakes on the robotaxi project undertaken through its Cruise division. Created in 2013 and acquired by the American giant in 2016, Cruise has struggled in recent years as it attempted to bring its Origin self-driving taxi project to fruition.
GM will instead look to merge the Cruise division with its technical teams to create a single group that will work on developing autonomous driving tech. Obviously, the work will be based on Super Cruise technology, already present in over 20 of GM’s vehicles.
Super Cruise is an advanced semi-autonomous driving system, capable of long-distance operation and even autonomous overtaking, as well as towing a trailer.
General Motors says the development of robotaxis required considerable time and resources, and it cites a market that’s highly competitive even in its infancy. Waymo cabs are already on the road in Austin, Texas, in Phoenix, Arizona and in San Francisco and Los Angeles in California.
As well, Tesla is planning on entering the fray with the robotaxi it recently presented.
As reported by Car and Driver, GM currently owns around 90 percent of Cruise and says it has reached agreements with other shareholders to increase its stake to over 97 percent; it plans to eventually acquire all the remaining shares. Once this is done, GM says it will restructure the division's operations by merging Cruise with other teams working on GM's autonomous driving technologies.
The company expects to complete the moves in the first half of next year. The restructuring is expected to save the company more than $1 billion USD.
