Robotaxis, mostly Waymo, is giving 1.3 million trips/months. Why?

Waymo, the self-direction unit of alphabet, recently announced that they are now offering 200,000 Self-driving taxes travel without a safety driver in the car every week, only passengers. They also recently changed their service to Austin to be sorted only through the Uber app. In San Francisco and Phoenix, the dedicated Waymo One app continues to be the way to order travel.

Waymo is not alone, although since the departure of the “Navigation” unit of General Motors they are very close to the United States. The MIight Mobility begins offering self-driving trips to Ann Arbor without security drivers, and in some other cities with security drivers. Recently they started the security driver’s service at Peachtree Corners, GA and will partner with Lyft to provide service in Atlanta through their application. May refused to give a travel number.

However, in China, some companies are giving trips without a security driver. The predominant player is Baidu Apollo, who reports that they made 1.1 million trips without security-driving last quarter, which is 84,000 per week. Pony.ai claims 26,000 per week, but it is not clear if everyone is without a security driver. Autox does not report numbers, but says there are 1,000 cars in action. Weride also does not report numbers.

Even with modest ratings for companies that do not report, this tells us that about 1.3 million trips are being taken monthly in robotaxis without a security driver. Some people who are not in one of the cities of Robotax still think that the ARs of running are not true, and that they will not be here for many years, or may never come. People in robotaxi cities are upset with them; They are already just a part of the landscape.

Why are they doing that?

Most services look a lot like a taxi or uber, and this has made many people imagine that it is the purpose of these projects. Some services look a bit like ships or transit, and transit people often imagine robocaries as a potential traveler for “Mile Last Mile” journey on existing transit lines. Both ideas are far from the truth. Yes, robotaxis will provide Uber as service, and yes, they will replace transit, but these are small potatoes. Some people even think that robotaxis will simply function as Uber drivers because today you can call them in the Uber app. No, they did not invested tens of billions to replace Uber truck drivers 22 $/hour or $ 27/hour truck driver. 1.3 million trips are still only experiments to learn how people use technology and how they value it.

The goal is much sharper. To replace most of the land transport industry, which today has an income of about $ 5 trillion worldwide. This is much more than giants like Google and Amazon and Baidu from their technology businesses. They do not want to replace Uber, or the taxi driver, but the whole industry. While no one will capture the entire market, and they will also make the shipping cheaper, it means being all these industries, because for the client, all these things will be replaced:

1. Automotive industry
2. Car dealers
3. Oil companies (or part of your electrical service)
4. Automotive service, from repairs to maintenance to car wash in parts
5. Insurance
6. Travel services
7. Transit agencies
8. Banks that write credit and rental lease
9. Submission, logistics and tall trucks
10. tires
11. Many others, from fun inside the car to the tourist travel in ambulances and everything else that happens on wheels.

So that means they don’t want to be Uber. They want to be Uber, Toyota, dealer, Exxon, Pep Boys, State Farm, Your Transit Agency, Gmac, UPS, Michelin and more all combined. These are the companies you pay for money in the current transport industry. Of course, they will not do it all, they will contract with companies like these to provide ingredients and services, but they will be under control, decide who makes the service and who receives the money. And no one will control what we hope.

In this process, they will allow us to redefine where we live and work, how to take about the form of our cities. Transport has always done this, and every century has seen a transport innovation – whether trains, cars or robocars, which reformulated the world.

Uber is partnership with Waymo both in the app to greet the trips, and running warehouses. Waymo gets customers without any effort, and Uber learns more about running a Robotaxis service. They hope to repeat their success to be the mediator who connects drivers with knights, but with human leaders, they have the power and control the game they will never with Waymo-Alfabeti Dwarfs as a company. Maybe they will find a role role, but they will not be mistaken who will work for whom. We don’t call it Foxconn iPhone, but it’s not bad to be Foxconn, As.

So no, it’s not just to make a Uber robotic driver. As much as they speculate because Google-an advertising company if you look at the balance-it was not the pioneer, is it to earn your attention with ads while in the car. That would be the tail that shakes the dog. Mobility is a much larger industry than advertising.