Waymo to test its autonomous driving technology in over 10 new cities
120 comments
·January 29, 2025dageshi
Animats
> 'm convinced that Waymo will quietly continue to roll out self driving taxi's to ever increasing areas in "beta" until one day they're covering a significant percentage of the most profitable areas to be a taxi in.
Makes sense. Ten cities are most of the US taxi market.[1] New York City alone is about a third. New York will be tough in several directions, but Waymo will probably succeed there eventually. Meanwhile, they can just scale up in LA.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxis_of_the_United_States
danvoell
I feel like some people have been using "most profitable areas" instead of saying dense urban areas and upset that it might take a while to reach rural and suburban areas. Is that what you are saying? What business is not in the business of pursuing the most plausible profitable direction first?
dageshi
I think the general public has believed that self driving would arrive as some big bang moment where it just "worked" in 95%+ of environments where people drive. One morning there'd be an announcement it was cracked and then in six months you'd be able to buy a new car with it.
I don't think from either a business, technical or legal perspective google ever wants to sell or license their tech directly to a car being sold to the public.
They want to run a taxi service, they plan on running a taxi service, they're never going to sell it directly to consumers but they don't want consumers thinking about the implications of that.
They're just going to keep expanding Waymo in the background till it's ubiquitous.
HPMOR
Most startups actually.
kart23
Are they even profitable in SF or LA? I don't disagree with you, but if being profitable means charging more than Uber/Lyft and having slower trips on average than a human, thats not gonna work out too well. And these are the highest CoL cities in the us, meaning that if its not profitable there, might not be profitable anywhere.
jedberg
Why do you think the trips are slower than a human? I've only taken one Waymo trip (and my wife two) but in each case it didn't feel any slower than a Lyft. But it felt a lot safer! They definitely drive better than any human Lyft driver I've ever had.
And the prices seems to roughly match Uber/Lyft. Sometimes they're higher sometimes lower. The one ride I took I chose the more expensive Waymo just for the better experience. You don't have to worry about what the driver might say or do that makes you uncomfortable or unsafe.
someperson
Waymos are terrible at taking unprotected left turns into bumper to bumper traffic during peak hour.
They aren't aggressive like a normal driver when traffic is stopped and there's a clear but small gap that would result in the car being at an angle crossing traffic.
The lidar can't see any gap between cars when trying to turn into a more distant lane, so any obstruction to a close lane due to traffic kills them.
Source: been stuck in and observed Waymo in this situation for 10+ minutes several times.
A human driver is willing to make the turn much sooner.
Don't take a Waymo if you're in a hurry and the route will have such a left turns.
strifey
Their wait times tend to be worse, but that's getting better too. The trip speed has also noticeably improved. I've taken about 50 over the past 2 years.
Even if they're sometimes slower in pickup or trip time, on average, I greatly value the consistency of the experience over everything else.
bps4484
I should first note that I'm a big fan of waymo and want autonomous to succeed generally.
I take both waymo's and lyft/uber all the time in sf and waymo's are way slower. I'd estimate it at 10-15% slower. Once the novelty of a waymo wears off you realize that they drive like a high anxiety teenager and going 15 mph on a 15 mph road, coming to gentle full stop at every stop sign, and being very tentative on turns and passing people all add up to a very slow ride.
You're right though it definitely feels safer.
aiauthoritydev
Operational profits is not really a goal for Waymo in near term. The current goal is to be many years ahead of competition, getting permits to operate in major profitable cities with profitable routes.
The cost of a Waymo car right now is around $150K. Soon, Waymo will build its own cars (with partnership with some car manufacturer) from scratch which will bring this cost to around $40K.
currently WayMo has around 2 people per car employed in service roles which will be like 2 people per 50 cars. At that point they will be swimming in profits.
rob74
> The current goal is to be many years ahead of competition
The problem with this is that one of their competitors (Tesla) now has very powerful friends in the government which are certainly not above using that power in their favor...
ugh123
> currently WayMo has around 2 people per car employed in service roles
Do you have a source for this? I'm curious about their operations
dageshi
I'm pretty certain they won't undercut Uber or other taxi services any time soon because they don't want to provoke the political headache that comes with it. That type of politics could shutdown their licenses, I'm sure they want to avoid that at all costs so they're pricing above existing services.
What they may do is refuse to raise prices and eventually inflation will make them the cheapest.
Rodeoclash
They can charge more in Melbourne and I'll happily pay it to avoid drivers that cancel the trip after accepting or accept the trip and drive away from me until I cancel.
RivieraKid
Charging about as much as their competitors is probably the profit-maximizing strategy.
standardUser
They're already the cheapest if they match prices because there is no tip required. In the long run they'll inevitably be cheaper because of higher utilization of their vehicles and (vastly) lower labor costs.
AlotOfReading
They're probably within reasonable distance of gross profit, and much farther from net profit because of the imbalance between their current fleet size and the massive ongoing manufacturing and R&D costs. The organizational goal is not immediate net profits though.
Take this with the grain of salt it deserves. No one relying solely on publicly available information can give you anything more than highly speculative guesses.
Animats
Maybe not profitable yet. But each generation Waymo car seems to cost about half of the previous generation.
spjt
I would pay more for a slower ride just to avoid having to pay a tip.
rwmj
I will pay more to avoid having to talk to the driver. Last taxi I took, the driver started talking to me about all the different world religions.
lopkeny12ko
You will certainly be happy to learn that Waymo is in fact introducing tipping.
asdasdsddd
>but if being profitable means charging more than Uber/Lyft and having slower trips on average than a human
thats just a function of the numbers of cars on the road
simonw
I honestly don't understand the appeal of a private self-driving vehicle as opposed to a taxi-style rental service.
I like that Waymo has human backup! Knowing that if the car gets into a tricky situation there's someone who can remote control it back out again is very reassuring.
I also like not having to think about where it parks, what it's doing when I'm not in it etc.
jedberg
I would love to have one! Imagine all the benefits you just listed, but it's just mine so I can keep my stuff in it. Maybe my car seat or my work equipment or my shopping bags.
I get where I'm going and I send it over the the parking garage a mile away that's cheap, and then summon it back when I'm done with my event, so I never have to circle for parking. If enough people to it, they would probably develop a protocol so that they can be parked at a lot that is super dense and it's a puzzle to get the cars in and out.
And they could still be sold with remote human backup services (as well as giving you the owner the ability to take over if you want to).
I could also send it on errands. Go to Target and pick up my curbside order. Go to the pizza place and have them drop it on the front seat. Pick up my kid from school and bring her home. Go pick up my mother in law and bring her to my house so I don't have to go get her!
And I could use it to drive me to my parents house 350 miles away while I sleep.
I can think of a million reasons I'd want one.
dageshi
I've been thinking about this.
In self driving world it no longer makes sense for a car to look like they do now.
Instead I think they operate a bit like Coach and Horses used to. You the consumer own the "coach", you have it specced out how you want it, your choice of seating (hell even a bed?), your sound system, your big screen tv, whatever you want because you're a passenger not the driver.
The "horses" are the self driving bit + batteries. The ubiquitous taxi service owns these. Maybe you permanently rent a low range model (100 miles) that is attached to your "Coach" at all times for quick errands. For longer range journeys you hire a model with more battery and longer range that drives over and attaches automatically to your coach.
For really long range journeys, your self driving "horse" drives into a coaching station along the way, detaches and another one attaches in 30 seconds and off you go.
AlotOfReading
Maintaining an autonomous vehicle comes with a significantly higher maintenance burden than a regular car right now. Even if the sticker price were the same, would you be willing to check the air pressure regularly, take the vehicle in for calibration, clean the sensors, do software updates, implement the legal reporting responsibilities, etc? That's the current reality.
Most people don't want that and there's no market for it. Consumers (rightly) expect a vehicle that just works. It's still early days for this technology and building something that works as reliably/independently as the rest of a car isn't possible yet.
adamanonymous
I think most people would rather have their car circle the block indefinitely, rather than pay for parking and wait for their car to summon, which would create so many new traffic problems.
I'm picturing herds of empty Model 3's endlessly circling every city's downtown office district
xnx
> but it's just mine so I can keep my stuff in it
In the distant future (10 years?) we may have private trailers/pods that are moved by self-driving vehicles. Best of both options.
RivieraKid
They're already covering 0.25% of total US paved road network per my napkin calculation.
null
fooblaster
yeah, that's exactly what they are going to do. It's how Uber worked as well.
jsight
I've been poking at Uber forums and other places, and I'm noticing that a _lot_ of people are underestimating this. Waymo is growing by >100%/year at the moment and this is a significant part of that growth.
It'll make a huge dent in demand for Uber/Lyft over the next five years.
jillesvangurp
Unless those companies stumble on competing solutions that they can use to level the playing field. Waymo doesn't have this market to itself in perpetuity. Uber and Lyft basically have lots of revenue and can afford to take some bets on experimenting with different partners for self driving at a relatively low risk.
There are plenty of other companies experimenting with self driving taxis, cars, trucks, etc. And not just in the US. China is probably a lot further than Waymo on this front. In the end it boils down to cost at scale. Waymo has some early learnings for this, which is great, but it's no guarantee that somebody else won't come along and match what they are doing. Or massively improve on what and how they are doing what they are doing.
Tesla is the controversial one to mention in this context but I no longer believe that they'll get there first or exclusively. They might still get there. And maybe it won't even take that long. But they have a lot to prove and there are lots of other companies field testing working taxis with real passengers (unlike Tesla) at this point.
I wouldn't count Uber out. I'd say they are well aware of the challenges here and have a huge stake in ensuring that there will be multiple autonomy providers for them to choose from that all need the same thing to succeed: access to paying customers. Which is something that Uber has. The near future is likely to be mostly non-autonomous with specific geofences running experiments with autonomous driving in a limited number of places. Uber works in all those places and all they need is access to autonomous options in areas as that becomes available. They don't need to own or develop this in house. They just need access and some revenue share deal. More providers means more competitive deals.
I wouldn't be surprised to seem them close multiple, non-exclusive deals on this front in the next years. Possibly even with Waymo or Tesla. Or both. And then some.
JumpCrisscross
> Uber and Lyft basically have lots of revenue
Waymo is level with Lyft in San Francisco [1].
> plenty of other companies experimenting with self driving taxis, cars, trucks, etc.
None with a track record. The only wild card is Tesla.
[1] https://www.ktvu.com/news/waymo-ridership-skyrocketed-in-sf-...
jillesvangurp
Chinese autonomous deployments are pretty substantial at this point. And compared to places like Beijing, San Francisco is a bit of a small & rural village. China is rolling out at a faster pace than Waymo. More vehicles, more cities, more companies, larger cities, etc.
miki123211
I wouldn't be surprised if Uber/Lyft essentially end up as aggregators for autonomous cars.
You'll have multiple (local) companies, possibly Uber franchisees, maintaining autonomous fleets and doing the low-margin work of car cleaning, acquiring the vehicles, servicing them etc. Uber will be the interface between the passenger and those companies.
Uber could even keep some human drivers for peak-traffic situations that it would be uneconomical for a ppurely autonomous fleet to handle.
sadeshmukh
Interestingly, they're currently partnering with Uber in Florida if I remember correctly.
wolfram74
I wonder if the waymo solution is very vehicle specific or if it could be easily applied to say, a 10~12 person van that could accommodate a wheelchair? It would be interesting to design a transit system around 4~5 times as many vehicles with higher interval or more responsive pathing with something like pick up kiosks.
jasonpeacock
Many cities are already upgrading their transit systems to implement "rapid ride" where they run buses on a 10min schedule through popular routes.
This eliminates the need for planning routes - go the nearest stop, wait 10-15min (sometimes buses get bunched up so it's not really every 10min), and get on the next bus.
Buses already have drivers, wheelchair (and bicycle!) support, etc. and the stops usually have live tracking of the next arriving buses.
microtherion
I recently came across an article on the early years of the Zürich streetcar. In the early 1900s, 5 minute schedules were customary, with one especially busy line running a 3 minute schedule!
In contrast, nowadays the peak schedule is 7.5min.
ggreer
Self-driving makes the most economic sense when fewer people are in a vehicle. With a large van or bus, the cost of the human driver is split between more passengers. Also van or bus service is less compelling to individuals, as it makes them beholden to bus stop locations and schedules instead of picking them up and dropping them off when and where they want.
Adding support for wheelchairs introduces new failure modes that would require more software and/or human intervention. For example: Wheelchairs need to be strapped down for safety, and not all wheelchair users can do this themselves.
jasonpeacock
> Also van or bus service is less compelling to individuals, as it makes them beholden to bus stop locations and schedules instead of picking them up and dropping them off when and where they want.
Exactly this. The attraction of self-driving transit is the support for individual planning. Everyone gets a direct route to their destination, no delays stopping or detouring for other people.
There's also increased safety in having a personal ride. You're not being hassled, stalked, or threatened by random people.
no_exit
> You're not being hassled, stalked, or threatened by random people.
That's an odd thing to say. The only times I've ever been randomly threatened in public were on the road, by another driver.
JumpCrisscross
> With a large van or bus, the cost of the human driver is split between more passengers
It's also increased in that one must manage the passengers.
kalleboo
I'm seeing a lot of talk of there being a shortage of bus drivers in many places, so self-driving could probably still help increase service
Retric
That’s offset by dramatically lower prices and significant service in off peak hours.
Net result bus drivers are still a large fraction of the cost of bus service.
varelaseb
Are you... is this the micro-bus?
aiauthoritydev
Mass manufacturing vehicles is important part of their long term strategy. So I am pretty sure a large van with wheelchair support will be on cards.
DaedPsyker
Tokyo is one of the new cities, interesting. Is this the first non-US city waymo has tested in?
AlotOfReading
It's the first non-US city that they've done public testing in. They've been doing test track work in Europe for awhile now, and Cruise did some Japanese/middle eastern testing before they folded.
ElijahLynn
The article does not actually list the 10 cities. Nor does it link to a source or say the source.
actinium226
> In addition to ongoing trips to Truckee, Michigan's Upper Peninsula, Upstate New York and Tokyo, the expansion includes testing in San Diego and Las Vegas, with more cities yet to be announced.
ElijahLynn
They list a few cities but not 10 cities.
onlyrealcuzzo
Presumably this is counting Atlanta, Miami, and Austin - which were already announced as expansion markets for 2025.
See "coming soon" on the WayMo homepage: https://waymo.com/
That's 9 total.
jedberg
> with more cities yet to be announced
vaughnegut
Anyone know how it does in wintery places? I'm seeing that it's in Michigan now
JumpCrisscross
"In addition to ongoing trips to Truckee, Michigan's Upper Peninsula, Upstate New York and Tokyo, the expansion includes testing in San Diego and Las Vegas, with more cities yet to be announced."
Pitching my own book here, but I think Jackson Hole would be a great place for Waymo. It's clearly delineated, has basically no freeway driving, affluent residents and a constant influx of tourists for brand building. The only challenge is snow, but the roads are well plowed and drivers generally careful. If you're working in Truckee, I can't imagine it will be a much-bigger challenge.
spankalee
I imagine they'll need a ton of testing and adjustments for driving in snow for all the conditions the car needs to detect and plan around, like the wheels slipping, or the car as a whole sliding down a hill. This is probably a separate effort from mapping out a city, but then needs to be tested in the real world.
I think Truckee and Tahoe offer this environment within reasonable driving distance to the main Waymo development campuses.
bryanlarsen
They're testing in Upper Minnesota and upstate New York. Upstate New York contains the snowiest city in the US, Syracuse.
spankalee
Ah, good point then!
DCH3416
Not so much snow, as you have rapidly changing road conditions such as ice and freezing rain. And then factor in poor road markings and not always abundantly clear path finding.
The nice thing about EVs like they're using now. The electric motors are pretty good at responding and handling different road conditions, much faster than ICE vehicles since you can never quite predict what the engine is doing at a given moment.
AlotOfReading
Truckee/Tahoe is an extremely popular test area for bay area AV companies. Waymo's been testing there regularly since at least 2017.
thehappypm
Biggest difference is climate. Truckee's average highs never dip below 40F. Jackson has 2 months average highs below freezing -- that means a LOT more residual ice and snow.
8note
calgary could be a good spot
theyd want to shut off on the odd snow day that makes lines invisible, but its a lot like phoenix on having big wide roads, and the places to consistently play with snow cover are pretty empty/safe to screw up in
blackeyeblitzar
I didn’t realize there is a private equity and investing scene in Jackson Hole.
xyst
> think Jackson Hole would be a great place for Waymo
billionaire class wouldn’t be too happy with getting beta tested on raw tech. They will push back because “NIMBYism” runs deep.
JumpCrisscross
> they will push back because “NIMBYism” runs deep
Waymo is being adopted in wealthy areas first. To the extent there is NIMBY sentiment, it's towards rideshare drivers. (Also, billionaires probably wouldn't be taking Waymo. If their properties aren't fly in they're driving themselves.)
proudestmonkey
In SF, a lot of billionaires love taking Waymos
AutistiCoder
When will this be rolled out to everywhere else?
standardUser
Waymo has deep pockets and an incentive to play it safe. What it doesn't have is fierce competition forcing it to rush. Maybe that will change if/when Amazon's Zoox premiers this year.
dvh
In 2024 it had $365 million in revenue but $1.13 billion expenses.
OnlineGladiator
I love that you included numbers, but that is for all of Alphabet's "other bets" which includes Waymo, so it's not entirely Waymo. It still helps give ballpark figures though.
htrp
isn't waymo the majority of alphabets other bets?
lopkeny12ko
Telling that Waymo is trying to steal the thunder by releasing this news on the same day as Tesla's Q4 earnings report. They see the competition about to overtake them.
kouru225
You bring that crap to nyc and we’re making a special new waymo congestion price
rangestransform
I can’t wait until this hits NYC and the subway is forced to compete on all 3 of price, comfort, convenience
kouru225
The subway already wins the competition with uber and drivers. 1 million drivers per day and 2 million riders per day. The subway is king . I love it so much.
xnx
Pull up the MTA tracks and let Waymo better use the right of way.
ugh123
So you prefer human taxi drivers?
kouru225
I prefer streets that don’t have traffic so pedestrians can walk freely, and watching these waymo cars trap themselves and cause 30 minute long traffic jams because their code accidentally put them in a holding pattern is a genuine nightmare
rangestransform
If we want to exaggerate issues with each mode of transport, I prefer getting to my destination without getting stabbed, pushed onto the tracks, getting my nostrils assaulted by the smell of bodily fluids, having my ears assaulted by the train in the tunnels (14th/union sq 456 especially), having my ears assaulted by a showtimer, or waiting 20 mins for a train at 3am
xyst
I hate ADS tech in cities so much. The pedestrian/pet detection is god awful. Doesn’t matter if you cross at designated crosswalks or just crossing the street. Many close calls.
Cruise _was_ the king in this aspect and avoided them completely but Waymo is getting up there.
Side note: GOOG and other tech conglomerates are clearly monopolizing the tech industry - from ADS to AI/AGI/LLM. It’s no wonder these companies have kissed the ring of current administration to get the green light on acquisitions needed to setup monopolies and effectively become a monopsony (particularly in labor to keep wages down).
rangestransform
Would any smaller of a company had the funds to acquihire an entire darpa challenge team and have them seemingly fruitlessly work on autonomous driving for over 10 years? We have already seen what happens when the parent company is any less patient and deep pocketed, with cruise and GM.
fragmede
> The pedestrian/pet detection is god awful
When I walk in front of a Waymo it stops and gives me space and doesn't come anywhere near hitting me. That doesn't qualify as "god awful" to me. do you have a different experience?
I'm convinced that Waymo will quietly continue to roll out self driving taxi's to ever increasing areas in "beta" until one day they're covering a significant percentage of the most profitable areas to be a taxi in.
Instead of trying for universal self driving, they're going to prioritise being self driving taxi's for the most profitable areas.