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☆ Waymo workers form union in the latest push to organize Silicon Valley
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-10 | by ( Eli M. Rosenberg | Eli Rosenberg Is An Investigative Tech Reporter For Nbc News. | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +6 min

Food service employees at the autonomous driving company Waymo are forming a union, the latest push by support workers to organize at Silicon Valley's most prominent companies. The workers are employed by Sodexo, which contracts service work for Google and other companies. "We are confident this one will also reach an amicable agreement for workers, the union, and our client very soon." The workers are part of Silicon Valley's ranks of contractors who support and supplement the work at tech companies. Her team unionized in 2020, and some of them have been joining meetings with the Waymo workers to show them the ropes of organizing and talk up the union.

☆ The era of Big Tech moonshots is over. Amazon, Google, Facebook, and Microsoft are pulling back on ambitious, risky long-term projects after many of them failed.
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-29 | by ( Hugh Langley | Eugene Kim | Kali Hays | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +13 min

Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and Facebook have scaled back their ambitious "moonshot" projects. Moonshots like Google X and Amazon Grand Challenge allowed tech firms to build innovative projects. Before Amazon, Parviz led a similar team at Google called Google X. Page and Brin championed X projects they loved, helping them gain funding and headcount within the unit. Parviz, who created the once-hyped-up Google Glass, left Google X in 2014 to start Amazon's Grand Challenge.

☆ Analyst says this FAANG stock is an evergreen winner — and investors should buy the dip
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-29 | by ( Zavier Ong | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

Investors may be fleeing the sector in droves, but Barton Crockett, senior research analyst at Rosenblatt Securities, said the sell-off is an opportunity for long-term investors to buy the dip. One such "winner" that Crockett likes is Alphabet , which he described as a "good story" that will be "here today and tomorrow." But the stock has outperformed all its peers in the FAANG (Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, and Google) grouping except Apple . 'Be choosy' Despite the challenges of the current investing climate, Crockett said investors should remain exposed to tech. "You have to have the fortitude to ideally absorb some of the near-term gyrations for a long-term return," he said.

☆ The era of the Big Tech moonshot is over
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-29 | by ( Jordan Parker Erb | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Each of these ideas is a "moonshot," or a radical, potentially world-changing project that Big Tech companies have worked on in recent years. Is the era of Big Tech moonshots over? For years, companies like Amazon, Google, and Facebook dumped money and energy into radical, potentially world-changing projects. But recently, Big Tech firms have been scaling back their ambitions — and have instead turned to a Wall Street-appeasing pragmatism. It comes after Amazon workers of all types have been pushing for higher pay for years.

☆ Waymo Fills Finance Chief Role as Autonomous-Vehicle Company Looks to Expand
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-23 | by ( Jennifer Williams-Alvarez | ) www.wsj.com time to read: +3 min

Waymo LLC hired a new finance chief as the autonomous-vehicle company works to boost self-driving capabilities and expand in multiple regions. The Mountain View, Calif.-based company, a subsidiary of Google parent Alphabet Inc., on Friday said it named Elisa de Martel as chief financial officer. The company’s interim head of finance and its controller have covered the company’s finances while Waymo looked for a permanent CFO, according to a spokeswoman. Two months earlier, Waymo’s biggest competitor— General Motors Co. subsidiary Cruise—began offering driverless rides to the public in San Francisco. Waymo since 2017 also has tested its driverless technology in semitrucks.

This is the first time Cruise has acknowledged the long-term need for remote human operators. Truly autonomous vehicles are far behind the optimistic rollout schedules predicted just a few years ago. In a June interview on YouTube, Musk said developing self-driving cars was "way harder than I originally thought, by far." Over time, those people will act as "air traffic controllers," supervising a growing number of autonomous cars. "Even decades from now you will not get to 100% truly autonomous vehicles," Kaveh added.

☆ 22-year-old shares nightmare of getting scammed by a fake job: 'I went from excited to devastated in a month'
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-18 | by ( Jennifer Liu | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +6 min

Callie Heim, 22, went viral on TikTok for sharing how she got scammed by a fake job listing. Callie Heim was thrilled to start her marketing job with Waymo, the buzzy self-driving car company, earlier this summer. Heim had been scammed by a fake job listing. She was invited to a phone interview the next day, where the interviewer said the job would entail getting a computer and phone to do her job remotely. In reality, this is what's known as a fake check scam, where scammers hope you'll send them money and "reimburse" you with a bad check.

☆ Baidu's robotaxis don't need any human staff in these parts of China
▼ + stars: | 2022-08-08 | by ( Evelyn Cheng | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

Chinese tech company Baidu announced Monday it can sell some robotaxi rides without any human staff in the vehicles. BEIJING — Chinese tech company Baidu said Monday it has become the first robotaxi operator in China to obtain permits for selling rides with no human driver or staff member inside the vehicles. The local government approvals allow Baidu's Apollo Go robotaxi business to eliminate the cost of human personnel in some instances. But the Chinese capital still requires human staff to sit in the robotaxi with passengers. In the U.S., Alphabet's Waymo and General Motors ' subsidiary Cruise can already run public robotaxis with no human staff in the vehicles.

☆ Driverless taxis approved in California for the first time – but the rollout will be gradual
▼ + stars: | 2022-06-03 | by ( Tasmin Lockwood | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Autonomous car company Cruise is rolling out driverless taxis in San Francisco. Autonomous car company Cruise is on track to operate driverless taxis in San Francisco after winning California's first driverless deployment permit on Thursday. There has long been a buzz around driverless cars. More than $100 billion has been invested in autonomous vehicle technology since 2010, according to McKinsey. This could be the year that the potential of driverless cars is realised as Cruise joins an exclusive list of companies operating commercially.

☆ There's a shortage of truckers, but TuSimple thinks it has a solution: no driver needed
▼ + stars: | 2021-07-14 | by ( Jacopo Prisco | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +12 min

One solution to the problem is autonomous trucks, and several companies are in a race to be the first to launch one. The journey was completed in 14 hours versus the usual 24 with a human driver, mostly because a truck doesn't need to sleep. Its plans are dependent on state legislation, however, because currently some states do not allow for testing of autonomous trucks on public roads. According to Lu, that's still cheaper than paying for a human driver. But you're saving the cost of a human driver, which based on average US wages is about $80,000 to $120,000 per year -- or 80 cents to $1.20 per mile.

☆ California va avea primul serviciu de livrare fără șofer
▼ + stars: | 2020-12-25 | by ( Publika.Md - Aici Sunt Știrile | ) www.publika.md time to read: +1 min

California a aprobat pentru prima dată un serviciu comercial de livrare fără șofer, startup-ul Nuro urmând să înceapă operațiunile comerciale de anul viitor. Vehiculele R2 au fost testate în luna aprilie a acestui an, însă de acum, ele pot taxa clienții pentru serviciile sale, anunță BBC. Nuro a fost fondată de doi foști ingineri Google, iar startup-ul a ajuns să valoreze peste 5 miliarde de euro. În luna octombrie, în Phoenix, Arizona, au început să opereze taxiuri care nu au șofer, ca parte a serviciului Waymo, ce aparține de Google. Un alt serviciu similar este în prezent în teste în orașul Shanghai din China și este susținut de gigantul online de tehnologie și comerț cu amănuntul, Alibaba.

Persons: Nuro Organizations: BBC, Google Locations: California, SUA, Phoenix, Arizona, Shanghai, China

La un moment dat, Apple și-a reevaluat obiectivele și a decis să se concentreze pe software. De atunci, Apple a progresat suficient încât să urmărească acum să construiască un vehicul pentru consumatori, au spus două surse anonime. Apple a refuzat să comenteze planurile sale sau produsele viitoare, potrivit descopera.ro. Tesla a avut nevoie de 17 ani înainte ca de a obține profituri din producția de automobile. Dar, în același timp, nu este un telefon mobil”, a spus o persoană care a lucrat la Project Titan.

Persons: Doug Field, Tesla, Trip Miller, Miller Organizations: Titan, Apple, Apple ., Project Titan, Capital

Herbert Diess susţine că la baza acestor previziuni este faptul că performanţa chip-urilor de calculator se dublează la fiecare 18 luni, iar progresele realizate în domeniul inteligenţei artificiale urgentează şi ele dezvoltarea de autovehicule autonome, potrivit Agerpres . „Ne putem aştepta ca în curând sistemele să fie capabile să gestioneze chiar şi cele mai complexe situaţii create de condusul autonom", a declarat Herbert Diess pentru săptămânalul german WirtschaftsWoche. Diess a dezvăluit că în urmă cu un an şi jumătate a călătorit el însuşi cu un automobil autonom dezvoltat de firma americană Waymo. Într-un regim de trafic lejer, cu vreme bună şi o viteză mai mică de 70 de kilometri pe oră, totul funcţionează destul de bine", a spus Herbert Diess. Acesta s-a declarat impresionat şi de performanţele producătorului american de automobile electrice Tesla.

Persons: Herbert Diess, . Diess, Tesla, Diess Organizations: Agerpres, Volkswagen, BMW Locations: american

☆ Self-driving robotaxis are taking off in China
▼ + stars: | 2020-12-03 | by ( Michelle Toh | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

On Thursday, AutoX, an Alibaba (BABA)-backed startup, announced it had rolled out fully driverless robotaxis on public roads in Shenzhen. Previously, companies operating autonomous shuttles on public roads in the country were constrained by strict caveats, which required them to have a safety driver inside. In Shenzhen, AutoX has completely removed the backup driver or any remote operators for its local fleet of 25 cars, it said. Race of the robotaxiWhile AutoX has claimed an edge in China, it’s not the first time fully driverless shuttles have hit public roads. In June, Didi, China’s biggest ride-hailing firm, began offering free rides in its autonomous vehicles within a designated area of Shanghai.

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