Uber has never made it a secret that it wants self-driving cars to pick you up and get you to your destination in the future, and if a future where it doesn’t have to pay human drivers could get here sooner than later, well, that would be even better. So how long until you can summon a self-driving Uber? How about in the next two weeks.
Uber is planning to roll out a test fleet of self-driving Volvo XC90 SUVs in Pittsburg literally this week or next, according to Bloomberg. No, the modified XC90s won’t ghostride up to your location, there will still be an actual human in the driver’s seat ready to take over if the traffic gets a little bit too complicated for the autonomous systems to handle. At least, for now.
Additionally, Uber has just bought Otto, a maker of self-driving tech that can be adapted to old-fashioned human-guided cars and, yes, trucks. Really big trucks, as in semis, like this one. The Otto deal is a significant move in that it puts Uber in a position to expand its business into a key new area: trucking.
Uber hopes to do for cargo transport what it did for ridesharing, and with the Otto staff full of ex-Google and Apple self-driving car project members, there’s a pretty good chance they’ll do it.
SUBSCRIBE FOR THE LATEST VIDEOS
VISIT DIGITAL TRENDS
CHECK OUT OUR LATEST PODCAST
FOLLOW US!
