Waymo and Toyota outline partnership to advance autonomous driving deployment
254 comments
·April 29, 2025zetazzed
lxgr
> They will EXPLORE collaborating on ACCELERATING development.
Compared to "FSD this year", every year for the past five years, I honestly find the approach pretty refreshing.
beambot
5 years...? I bought mine with FSD in 2018, and that was years after it was "right around the corner." Worst Kickstarter of all time... Though I do like the car itself.
esalman
> Compared to "FSD this year", every year for the past five years, I honestly find the approach pretty refreshing.
As an 11 years Toyota driver I agree.
bagels
This is at the other extreme end though. They could do nothing and call the agreement to explore satisfied. Would rather they wait till they've removed at least three of the hedging words.
slt2021
this is just the opposite extreme of "FSD this year"
aantix
Except there’s FSD videos everywhere on X with every minor release, demonstrating the progress.
kevin_thibedeau
They edit their videos to remove the mistakes. It's all a lie if it only works 90% of the time and you don't know when it's going to fail after being lulled into inattention.
acdha
Yes, that’s called marketing. Believe it when they do what Mercedes does and accept liability rather than trying to shirk it.
adrr
Progress would be get certified for self driving. For comparison, Mercedes, BMW, Honda etc have L3 cars on the market. Mercedes just got approved full highway speeds in EU and working on L4 certification.
xnx
If progress is noticable in a 20 minute video, Tesla has a long way to go.
vachina
FSD is something you can BUY and USE right now. Toyota is writing an MoU. They’re not the same.
adrr
FSD can’t self drive on any street though. Its just L2 like cruise control and lane centering.
proudestmonkey
Waymo is something that actually drives itself and you can hail right now. FSD is not actually “full self-driving”.
kevin_thibedeau
What you're buying is not driving, by itself, fully.
jannyfer
It reads like a Memorandum of Understanding.
WorldWideWebb
This headline brought to you by the marketing department.
pelagic_sky
Feels more like the typical battle amongst PR, Marketing and Legal.
AustinDev
Say everything and nothing in less than nine words.
owyn
Yeah, that's pretty amazing corporate speak. And the development time lines are long. I'm cautiously optimistic about this. Even if it is just a Toyota vehicle with Waymo brains, there is a Taxi/Van in Japan called the Alphard and it's pretty nice! Toyota also has the e-pallete, which is a self driving bus for their new Woven City project. It would be great to see a new vehicle platform co-developed for those purposes because the Toyota "electrical" architecture is about 10 years behind (all CanBus). If I was them I would sort that out before building new EVs. If you look at a bz4x and pop the hood, it looks like an IC vehicle! There is no frunk, just legacy junk. It was never designed as an EV, they just put an electric motor and a battery in a Rav4 type platform and called it a day.
skybrian
It’s too early to be of much interest to outsiders, but impressing people likely isn’t the intention. By announcing that they’re talking, they don’t need to keep its existence secret anymore or worry about it getting into the news at some random time as a “secret project.”
pavel_lishin
Veridian Dynamics' "Project Jabberwocky" is gonna be great.
lurk2
> They will EXPLORE collaborating on ACCELERATING development.
Concepts of a plan
null
floxy
>"Toyota Motor Corporation (“Toyota”) and Waymo reached a preliminary agreement to explore a collaboration focused on accelerating the development and deployment of autonomous driving technologies. "
The current HN title seems too definite.
dang
Ok, we've reverted the title to that of the article now. Thanks!
(Submitted title was "Waymo partners with Toyota to bring autonomous driving to personal vehicles")
bendoy
Took me a minute to find it, but the title seems accurate to me based on the second paragraph in the blog post from Waymo.
"In parallel, the companies will explore how to leverage Waymo's autonomous technology and Toyota's vehicle expertise to enhance next-generation personally owned vehicles (POVs)."
jader201
Not really. I feel that’s still a far cry from “bring[ing] autonomous driving to personal vehicles”.
“Enhance next-generation POVs” could be accomplished by bringing Toyota’s autonomous driving to the same level as Tesla’s, give where they are today.
And they’re not definitively “bringing” it. They’re just exploring bringing it.
bdangubic
bringing Toyota’s autonomous driving to the same level as Tesla’s
Toyota would not ever be getting into something to get to “Tesla-level” - like if they were hoping their kids end up C students ;)
loeg
Seems close enough modulo HN character limits.
prhn
The future of (public) transportation absolutely is driverless cars.
Every time I'm stuck in traffic on an LA highway with 5+ lanes and I see the horrendously inefficient use of space this future becomes clearer.
Waymos are also really confidence inspiring. They drive more safely and cautiously than any Uber/Lyft driver I've ridden with.
If every car on the road was synced then they could drive more closely to each other and at much faster speeds. This would optimize road space, decrease congestion, and reduce transit times.
So I'm happy to see more announcements like this. I hope the Waymo driverless tech becomes ubiquitous.
amoshebb
This “if cars were synced all would be well” fantasy assumes that the limited gains from scrunching won’t be a rounding error compared to the nearly unlimited additional trips that robots with infinite patience could start making.
Currently it’s got to be worth sitting at the wheel or paying a delivery driver… but if my robot says “6 hours to drive 10 miles”, I’ll think, “wow traffic is bad, whatever, it’ll get there when it gets there, beep, off you go! siri, text mom that the paint chip is on its way”, oh hmm actually maybe teal is better… “hey siri, get me another toyotaymo”
iknowstuff
I love AVs, but It would do jack shit for traffic and the horrible use of space until they become autonomous buses on dedicated bus lanes, or trains. You still gotta have spaces for pedestrians, and cars still make cities ugly and unpleasant. Even electric autonomous ones. Tire friction still makes noise and pollutes the air with microplastics.
They gotta supplement mass transit for dense cities, not replace it.
jes5199
Toyota has been way, way behind on electrification. I suspect they’ve been Innovator’s Dilemma’d are are in a death spiral that they haven’t even noticed yet
princevegeta89
Actually, we should also realize that they've been super wildly successful at getting people to move towards clean energy vehicles.
Prius is the world's highest selling Hybrid car, and it's been that for more than a decade now. This means Toyota has helped cut down emissions from consumer automobiles by a significant degree.
It's not the 1000 EVs out of the 100k vehicles that matter, but rather the 10k hybrid vehicles out of that same 100k pool, which literally produce double the MPG compared to ICE cars. It becomes obvious when we look at the total emissions generated by that pool of 100k cars.
If there's anyone to blame, I'd look at the luxury division - Mercedes, Audi and BMW (and also Genesis/Acura) - all late to the party, and still haven't been successful at meaningfully replacing the vehicles they would sell to their customers yet.
shreezus
Up until recently (~2022/23) Toyota had cumulatively sold more hybrids than all EVs sold by all manufacturers combined, globally. They arguably have the best hybrid drivetrain on the market, and it's gotten to the point where even the Camry (2025 onwards) are exclusively offered as hybrids now.
princevegeta89
>> Camry (2025 onwards) are exclusively offered as hybrids now.
This is a very dope move. Glad to hear that
Retric
Hybrids are a dead end. There’s already EV’s doing 1MW charging. That’s practically gas pump speeds while also being able to charge at home, and the underlying technology keeps improving.
8% of new cars in the US, 14% in the EU, and 27% in China are EV’s. Toyota’s EV sales are anemic by comparison.
doublescoop
Hybrids are the only choice for the vast majority of the country that doesn't have the needed infrastructure to support EVs. If you never leave your urban enclave, then sure, EVs are great. But hybrids are perfect for _right now_, even if EVs are the future.
The Toyota hybrid engine is also rock solid and has been for more than a decade. They don't have a reason to abandon that right now when the industry is highly unstable and government funding for infrastructure that isn't Tesla's is being cut left and right.
hnav
Toyota does not want to sell a lot of EVs, because that could mean investing heavily to scale up the manufacturing of a dead-end technology that ends up losing out. Meanwhile they've been iterating on their hybrid tech and are selling 50 MPG vehicles by the millions. When the dust settles, a lot of EV companies will be out of business and their products will be e-waste with 0 spares anywhere. Toyota on the other hand generally uses the same technology for decades to build very predictable appliance-like vehicles. This is why a 3 year old EVs have 40% residuals while used Toyotas are 60%.
reneretord
[dead]
jes5199
yes exactly, that is the kind of success that prevents you from believing that the next big thing is going to worse-is-better you out of the market
dekhn
Toyota makes hybrids that are excellent. I don't think they want to go full EV.
seanmcdirmid
They can pretend that hybrids are enough but many markets are going full EV regardless while Toyota only has a half baked solution.
thehappypm
Not everyone wants an EV, especially in America. Unless EV’s can jump to 500 mile range and ubiquitous five minute charging, a lot of people are just gonna want a hybrid.
ajmurmann
What is their beef with full-EV? First it was hydrogen fuel cells and now limitation to hybrid. Seems odd at best.
makeitdouble
Not mature enough to Toyota's taste, probably.
Hydrogen fuel cell is more about diversification, and it is fully backed by the Japan gov so ROI would be through the roof even if it doesn't "win".
Also many countries aren't producing enough electricity (cough Japan and Germanycough) so EVs getting popular _at scale_ isn't going to happen tomorrow either.
ProjectArcturis
It's more expensive for a worse consumer experience.
sidibe
I think they've just never liked the range. They're waiting for solid state batteries to work at that scale
ern
I suspect it's that they build excellent ICE vehicles, and were quick to go to hybrids but missed the rise of EVs. Everything we're seeing is a rearguard action to protect their ICE business.
cryptoegorophy
I believe they’re batten on solid-state technology, which is like nuclear fusion. 10 years away
GloamingNiblets
This is 100% intentional, they have been clear that their strategic direction is hybrids, not pure electric. Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/peterlyon/2024/03/03/bucking-in...
m463
> have been clear
I disagree. They backed hydrogen / fuel cells for most of the years others were developing bevs.
princevegeta89
The Hydrogen/fuel-cells were not mass-marketable for some reason, and also beyond that they have been hard to manufacture and sustain, especially when it came to setting up that network of fueling stations and adoptability for customers.
mullingitover
Isn't that Japan in general, and for national security reasons? AFAIK they're wholly dependent on China for crucial mineral components in EVs, and 'burning the boats' by abandoning internal combustion manufacturing would effectively turn them into China's vassal.
throwaway48476
Rare earth's aren't rare.
daedrdev
China processes ~90% of rare earth raw materials into actual rare earths
Enginerrrd
As far as I can tell, I cant disagree harder. Toyota has been making EXCELLENT design decisions and providing great value to consumers.
For most of America, EV'S and the associated infrastructure aren't QUITE there yet.
overstay8930
Hybrids are barely mainstream and are growing faster than EVs, Toyota doesn't have anything to worry about for a long time.
jes5199
that’s true today and yet they will be bankrupt by 2030
JumpCrisscross
> Toyota has been way, way behind on electrification
They’re Toyota. They can buy their way onto the winner’s table later.
vardump
I fear in the long run Toyota might be bought by some Chinese competitor. Like BYD.
Hopefully this won't happen.
s1artibartfast
You can sleep easy.
There is zero chance the Japanese government would let that happen.
lxe
Their new Prius Hybrid is an excellent car. Wish people didn't look away from hybrids due to all the EV hype.
standardUser
I know we Americans just love to own cars, what with the rapid depreciation, constant maintenance and massive storage requirements. Who could resist? But isn't the promise of self driving vehicles that we don't all need to own, maintain and operate a 4000lb machine? I know it's hard to resist dropping the $30k, $40k or even $50k and paying that monthly insurance we all love. But wouldn't it be better if we could just summon whatever vehicle we need for the hour and then get on with our lives? And more importantly, don't we all want the benefits that will come from having mostly robo-cars on the road - such as fewer accidents and injuries, less traffic, faster trips and more parking?
zik
That's one vision, but it's probably not the most likely one. People like privately owning cars, and as long as they're more convenient than hiring taxis it'll probably stay that way.
Here's another vision of the future - gradually everyone's cars become self-driving, and now cars are more accessible to a wider range of people. 30% of the population currently can't drive due to age or disability, but if cars drive themselves the elderly, disabled, and even children can now own and operate vehicles. And now you have 30% more cars on an already congested road system. That should be enough to make traffic jams the norm everywhere.
But in case that wasn't bad enough, consider this - now people can do other things while they travel, because they don't have to be driving. So, in turn, they can live further and further away from their workplaces in cheaper, larger houses and do more of their work on the go. And while they do this they're spending more time on the roads, and - you guessed it - causing more congestion.
And because parking will always be expensive and hard to find in busy city centers, people will set their cars to loiter while they visit, rather than parking. Just going round and round while their owners shop. Causing - you guessed it - even more congestion.
TL;DR - the most likely result of autonomous vehicles is out of control congestion.
hnav
When teleportation becomes a thing society will force supercommuters to teleport in from farther and farther-out to maximize shareholder value while remaining in compliance with their respective companies' hybrid work policies. That you arguably die and are recreated every time you pass through the portal will finally end all discussions around whether your life is worth more than productivity.
brummm
That's already possible and called taxis/uber/etc.
In what way would self driving cars incentivize not owning your own car?
spiderice
Simple. Not having a driver in the car. The driver is the only part of Uber I don't like. I feel like if I make them wait 20 seconds they could ding my rating. If I have kids with me, I hate having to get their carseat buckled, knowing the driver probably doesn't want kids in their car anyway. I hate the awkward silence. I hate listening to their shitty music. At no fault of their own, they are the only weak link in the Uber chain. Everything gets better for me if there just isn't a person waiting on me the whole time.
I'd sell my cars in a heartbeat if "Uber minus the driver" existed and was cheaper than owning a car.
standardUser
Cost, accessibility, convenience, reliability, safety. You can get all of that with a human driver too, if you're rich.
valenterry
In a few ways, no.
Taxis/uber etc. are all built as "regular cards". It requires at least 2 people in there. How often is actually more than 1 person in a car? Wasn't that like 2/3 of all drives?
Now let's assume we have specialized cars for just a single person - that saves a lot of material, fuel, and also (parking) space.
But that only works if you don't OWN the car, because if you own it, you might sometimes have to have passengers right? So you always get a big car that is not needed in 2/3 or so of the drives.
That aside, having another driver is annoying for various reasons (e.g. privacy).
RC_ITR
I have to pay to store my manually-driven car 90% of the day, because there's nothing else it could be doing while it waits for me.
A driverless car can very easily do things and make money while I'm waiting for it.
In some scenarios, people rent out their owned cars during the day to avoid this massive opportunity cost, but I doubt that will be the most efficient model.
In what other asset class ever has it made sense for the capital owners to be an extremely long tail of people, rather than a large corporate owner? Especially something as high velocity and fungible as cars.
Retric
Want I’d want to see is a focus on level 5 autonomous driving from day 1. (Edit: Even if the system is level 4 to start with.) Yes the current coverage area is limited, but if you live in one of those cities the coverage area is easily large enough to be useful.
Oddly enough I think this is one of the few times when a subscription model makes sense. The current approach has a fallback call center which can give the cars driving directions in unexpectedly situations, which could be supported by either a monthly subscription or low hourly fee. Similarly move out of the coverage area and stop paying etc.
jareds
As someone who's blind I've made this argument in the passed. I don't need 100% success as long as the failure mode won't injure me. Seven years ago I would have loved a car that would have driven me to and from work 95% of the time, and refused to take the other 5% if the weather forecast was bad enough that the self driving wouldn't work correctly. I'd also be fine with the car pulling over to the side of the road if it got confused and waiting for someone remote to take control and drive until it was out of the situation where autonomous driving wouldn't work. Given the fact that I now work remote and am married to someone who drives if you told me I could by a car with autonomous driving for $50000 now I don't think I'd do it. I'm interested to see just how good autonomous driving gets and if it drives down the prices of taxi services. At this point I'd rather see an autonomous taxi service offering lower rates then Uber instead of buying my own car with autonomous driving.
achatham
I think you may mean Level 4. The difference between 4 and 5 is that 5 doesn't have any territory/environmental constraints, but you said you don't mind those.
Retric
By focus on I mean that should be the goal.
If they require high speed cellular service then the system can’t scale to level 5 driving. Add a Starlink dish on top and the hardware could eventually scale to the entire continental US etc.
matt3210
If I can’t sleep while it drives me to work it’s not autonomous
caminanteblanco
That's the kind of autonomous that'll make a difference
UncleOxidant
I don't think we get there until we have all of the nearby vehicles on the road communicating.
slg
I can order a Waymo from my phone right now and sleep in the backseat while it drives me across town.
sidibe
Hard for me to square that opinion with the fact these are normal for people in some cities now
OJFord
That's what I want to, but I don't think it's really a fair complaint given that this has been reasonably well defined. What we both want is 'L5' (level five) autonomy, where the vehicle doesn't even need the ability to be manually driven necessarily.
(L4 iirc is hands-off but someone in the driver's seat (which must therefore exist) in a fit state to take over if necessary - no sleeping on the way in, no drinking on the way home.)
achatham
What you're describing is L4. L4 is fully autonomous but with limitations on where/when it can operate. Level 5 is that but without restrictions.
Level 2 and 3 are the mostly-automated version, and they differ in how much notice they're supposed to provide and how much attention they require.
duxup
I want to turn my mini van into a mini living room. Everyone climb in, let’s play some Point Salad or Splendor!
65
You can sleep in a Waymo taxi already.
xyst
You can already do this with commuter trains.
spiderice
What a joy for people who live near commuter trains
SkyPuncher
I want a step before it right now.
Let me use my phone or watch videos on the highway. I’m okay with taking over with a small amount of warning. I’m also okay doing all non-highway driving.
I just want something that can keep me in my lane and avoid ramming the vehicle in front of me. If I need to drive at the start and end of my trip, that’s okay.
aianus
This is what I want too, driving 15 min manually in the city doesn't bother me or tire me out at all, I just want to watch TV when driving straight on the interstate for 300 miles.
kyrra
This is the choice quote from the article:
"Toyota and Waymo aim to combine their respective strengths to develop a new autonomous vehicle platform. In parallel, the companies will explore how to leverage Waymo's autonomous technology and Toyota's vehicle expertise to enhance next-generation personally owned vehicles (POVs)."
gitroom
been watching this space forever, always cracks me up how we go from overhyped PR to endless hedging - nothing feels real till someone puts their name on the liability. anyone else think real change happens only when they truly risk something?
getnormality
I can't overstate how hopeful I am about Waymo. They are already literally 10x safer than human drivers [1] and they'd become vastly safer still if they completely replaced human drivers on the road. This would also make commuting a much more pleasant experience, which I think could greatly relieve the housing crisis in high-demand cities. Parents would have an alternative to hours of driving kids to activities.
I can't think of another pipeline technology that is both this proven and this impactful.
jofzar
This is probably the biggest car news in a long time
Ok, I appreciate that timelines in this space are long. But the opening phrase:
"Toyota Motor Corporation (“Toyota”) and Waymo reached a preliminary agreement to explore a collaboration focused on accelerating the development..."
reads a bit like a parody of corporate speak about a project nowhere close to happening. Did they agree to deploy? Or reach an agreement to collaborate? No, that's too strong. They will EXPLORE collaborating on ACCELERATING development.