General Motors is scaling back development of its Cruise unmanned taxis to focus on autonomous personal vehicles
General Motors (GM) said it will no longer fund the development of its commercial robotaxi business. The company will absorb its Cruise subsidiary, which develops unmanned vehicles, and merge it with its driver assistance features division, whose main goal is to create fully autonomous personal vehicles.
Here's What We Know
GM acquired drone car development startup Cruise in 2016 for $1 billion. Since then, the US automobile giant has invested billions of dollars in Cruise in an attempt to commercialise unmanned car technology through the robotaxi business.
GM said in a statement that the reasons for the change were "the significant time and resources that will be required to scale the business, as well as the increasingly competitive robotaxi market." GM expects the restructuring to reduce costs by more than $1 billion a year once the proposed plan is finalised, which is expected in the first half of 2025.
The dramatic change in strategy comes just a year after Cruise became embroiled in a scandal over an accident on 2 October. That's when a robotaxi hit a pedestrian and dragged him several metres along the road. This was followed by investigations, fines, layoffs and GM's increased control over the once promising unmanned driving startup.
Source: Techcrunch
