Alphabet Inc.’s autonomous car company Waymo announced its plans to begin exploring self-driving trucks on Thursday, June 1st.
“Self-driving technology can transport people and things much more safely than we do today and reduce the thousands of trucking-related deaths each year,” a Waymo spokesperson told BuzzFeed News.
Alphabet, Google‘s parent company, had been testing autonomous technology since 2009 and finally announced the launch of Waymo in December 2016. Since then, it has set in motion several driverless-car test-ride initiatives throughout Phoenix, Arizona.
The company had not expressed any interest in expanding to self-driving trucks beforehand. The news of Waymo’s self-driving truck project came about when a photograph was released, which a Waymo spokesperson later confirmed captured the start of the company’s autonomous truck testing.
“We’re taking our eight years of experience in building self-driving hardware and software and conducting a technical exploration into how our technology can integrate into a truck,” a Waymo spokesperson stated.
Waymo has also recently announced its partnership with ride-hailing service company, Lyft. This collaboration has been deemed an effort to compete against Uber, which currently holds the number one spot for ride-sharing services in the U.S.
Uber was also first to dive into the world of self-driving trucks. And the company recently announced the launch of Uber Freight, a new smartphone application that is designed to match trucking companies with loads to haul.
“We fundamentally believe that by focusing on drivers’ pain points we can solve the industry’s biggest challenges,” Uber said in the blog post. “Happy drivers means happy shippers, and ultimately everyone benefits, including the end consumers of the goods.”
However, Waymo and Uber have been entrenched in an extensive legal battle over allegedly stolen trade secrets. Anthony Levandowski, a former Google employee, was hired by Uber to lead its self-driving developments. Since then, Waymo has filed a lawsuit against its rival company for reportedly using stolen self-driving trade secrets.
In a statement, Uber called Waymo’s claims, “a baseless attempt to slow down a competitor.”
As part of the legal procedures, Levandowski was ordered by a federal judge to hand over evidence and testimony, which he refused while asserting his Fifth Amendment right to avoid self-incrimination. After months of Uber apparently pressuring Levandowski to cooperate with the investigation, the company decided to fire him for missing an internal deadline to hand over crucial information.
The lawsuit is still pending investigation.
Meanwhile, a Waymo spokesperson announced that the company is currently testing autonomous technology on just one truck.
Self-driving trucking is becoming more and more popular amongst companies across the U.S. due to the simple, long stretches of road navigation that trucking usually requires.
The latest company to join Waymo in autonomous truck technology is a start-up called Embark, which is using a hybrid model that allows a human driver to still be present in the vehicle so that he or she can take over control at any given time.
This particular model has been approved to begin testing on Nevada roadways.