General Motors backs out of self-driving taxi business

Instead, its Cruise “robotaxi” division will be merged into its Super Cruise hands-free driving development

  • General Motors will no longer fund Cruise, its majority-owned self-driving car division
  • Instead, it will move forward with further development of its Super Cruise hands-free system
  • Cruise’s work will be merged into GM’s internal assisted-driving tech team

General Motors isn’t abandoning the idea of self-driving cars, but if you want one, you’ll have to buy it, not hail it. The automaker is defunding its Cruise “robotaxi” development work, and merging it into its internal assisted-driving technology team. Instead of self-driving cabs, GM plans to simply move forward with its Super Cruise, its hands-free driving assist system that works on some 352,000 kilometres (218,000 miles) of pre-mapped highways in Canada and the U.S.

Cruise was an independent start-up, founded in San Francisco in 2013 to develop and test autonomous-vehicle technology. General Motors was on a roll when it acquired a majority interest in 2016; that year, it also formed a brand called Maven that would cover car-sharing fleets, and entered in to a strategic alliance with ride-hailing company Lyft.

Cruise Origin autonomous shuttle
Cruise Origin autonomous shuttlePhoto by Cruise

GM owns about 90% of Cruise, and said that in agreement with other shareholders, it will raise that to above 97% and then work with the Cruise team “to restructure and refocus Cruise’s operations.” The automaker estimates the restructuring will reduce its annual spending by US$1 billion once the plan is completed, likely in the first half of 2025.

Instead, the Cruise and GM technical teams will be combined “into a single effort to advance autonomous and assisted driving.” It’s getting out of the Cruise robotaxi plan “given the considerable time and resources that would be needed to scale the business, along with an increasingly competitive robotaxi market.”

The proposed Cruise AV self-driving car by General Motors
The proposed Cruise AV self-driving car by General MotorsPhoto by General Motors

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