Autonomous Waymo Trucks Will Start Delivering Furniture and Home Goods in Texas

Wayfair and Waymo announced on Tuesday that they will use their fleet of autonomous semi-trailer trucks to deliver home goods for the company. Waymo and JB Hunt Transport Services are conducting a pilot test in Texas to see if self-driving trucks can travel along certain shipping routes. Wayfair, one of JB Hunt's clients, will begin distributing goods using Waymo's vehicles for a six-week test starting July and August.

Waymo has expanded its service area to include all of Texas. Deliveries will be made in the state, with Waymo's Class 8 autonomous truck transporting goods along Interstate 45 between facilities in Houston and Dallas, which was the route utilized by Waymo and JB Hunt during last year's pilot. The trucks will operate autonomously but will be overseen by two Waymo employees from the cab of the vehicle.

Waymo is the self-driving car company that started it all. Waymo has been around since 2009, when it began as Google's "secret" project. Since inception, Waymo has operated in secret, yet today its name may be found on nearly every autonomous vehicle. The first round of funding was raised via Google Ventures in August 2010. In early 2015, the tech giant revealed that it had begun working on fully driverless trucks for commercial use following a number of partnerships and acquisitions with partners like Uber.

The JB Hunt spin-off has stated that it does not intend to purchase or run its own fleet of trucks but will instead collaborate with truck producers, carriers, and brokers to integrate its technology into the transport sector. In addition to JB Hunt, the firm is also in talks with CH Robinson and Uber Freight, the rideshare company's on-demand brokerage.

Waymo is preparing to put its fifth-generation "Driver," which includes hardware, sensors, and AI software, to the test on its own Class 8 truck fleet. A fully autonomous Level 4 system for trucks with Daimler, the parent company of Mercedes-Benz