{"id":2318,"date":"2018-05-21T00:01:43","date_gmt":"2018-05-20T14:01:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.alexshoolman.com\/blog\/?p=2318"},"modified":"2024-08-08T10:27:41","modified_gmt":"2024-08-08T00:27:41","slug":"fully-legit-self-driving-cars-are-launching","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.alexshoolman.com\/blog\/2018\/05\/21\/fully-legit-self-driving-cars-are-launching\/","title":{"rendered":"Fully Legit Self Driving Cars Are Launching!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Everyone has mostly heard <\/span>something<\/em> about Self Driving cars. Whether it’s a Tesla on the news, Uber killing a pedestrian or just that cute car Google made a while ago most are at least aware<\/strong> <\/em>of them.<\/span><\/p>\n

However so far they’re still a “developing technology”. They’re on the roads sure… but not for you or I. I can’t go out and ride in one. When my taxi pulls up after a night out there’s still a human driver in there so no one really takes the whole thing very seriously I think as it’s not “there” just yet.<\/p>\n

2018 is the year that this changes though.<\/p>\n

During the Google I\/O Keynote John Krafcik, the CEO of Waymo<\/a> came on stage and announced this:<\/p>\n

Phoenix will be the first stop for Waymo’s driverless transportation service, which is launching later this year. Soon, everyone will be able to call Waymo using our app and a fully self driving car will pull up, with no one in the driver’s seat, to whisk them away to their destination.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"

Source: waymo.com<\/p><\/div>\n

Coming To Phoenix 2018<\/h3>\n

That’s right. The fully available, consumer facing and usable product of self driving taxi services is coming to Phoenix by the end of this year. From there it’s just scaling up and with Waymo’s plan to deploy upwards of 20,000 Jaguar I-PACE’s<\/a> over the next 2 years… well that seems like a given.<\/p>\n

Also don’t be fooled into thinking that this rollout will be slow either. The I-PACE is a luxury car but Waymo is focussed on building the\u00a0driver.<\/strong><\/em> They have plans to roll their technology out to many partners in many cities with services for delivery of food, personal cars and even moving furniture or other goods in vans and trucks. They plan on having their driver technology in many, many cars just like Android is on many, many phones.<\/p>\n

The 20,000 number is\u00a0just for the I-PACE.<\/strong><\/em> I’ve no doubt they’ll be launching even more driverless vehicles of different types over that time too. Driverless cars can also drive 24\/7\/365 meaning those 20,000 cars alone could potentially drive\u00a0up to 1 million trips per day<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

For more details about it you can watch the presentation in the video below which starts at the right time index.<\/p>\n