Google preps self-driving car facility near Detroit as Chrysler partnership ramps up
Google on Wednesday announced plans to launch a "self-driving technology development center" in Novi, Mich., just outside the home of the American auto industry in Detroit.
-(2)-l.jpg)
The facility will span 53,000 square feet, and allow easier collaboration with industry partners -- as well as recruiting more talent in the sector, Google said. The move-in process should span the rest of 2016.
Google didn't elaborate much farther on what the center will handle, but did say that one of its first objectives will be preparing self-driving Pacifica minivans in partnership with Fiat Chrysler.
Many corporations across the auto and high-tech industies are beginning to partner on self-driving vehicles, from Google through to ridesharing services like Uber and Lyft. Indeed, Apple's $1 billion investment in Didi Chuxing could be connected, since ridesharing firms are ultimately expected to cut out human drivers, or even become a primary source of transportation.
Earlier this month a report claimed that Apple was eyeing 800,000 square feet in California for self-driving car work. The company is expected to ship some form of electric car in 2019 or 2020, though the first model may or may not be autonomous. Apple is allegedly developing charging infrastructure in preparation.
The facility will span 53,000 square feet, and allow easier collaboration with industry partners -- as well as recruiting more talent in the sector, Google said. The move-in process should span the rest of 2016.
Google didn't elaborate much farther on what the center will handle, but did say that one of its first objectives will be preparing self-driving Pacifica minivans in partnership with Fiat Chrysler.
Many corporations across the auto and high-tech industies are beginning to partner on self-driving vehicles, from Google through to ridesharing services like Uber and Lyft. Indeed, Apple's $1 billion investment in Didi Chuxing could be connected, since ridesharing firms are ultimately expected to cut out human drivers, or even become a primary source of transportation.
Earlier this month a report claimed that Apple was eyeing 800,000 square feet in California for self-driving car work. The company is expected to ship some form of electric car in 2019 or 2020, though the first model may or may not be autonomous. Apple is allegedly developing charging infrastructure in preparation.
Comments
It's a deal if the self-driving car has a Nest Smoke Detector
Seriously they have completed any major task?
Woe onto any engineer that takes up this opportunity.
For apple to succeed in the MP3 player market it needed a whole bunch of companies to define the market demand. Same with smart phones. iPad was really a outlier, really, every tablet PC sold for the prior 15 [i was looking at them in '95 for a medical application] years wanted to be the iPad.
Face it, Apple rarely defines a market. It refines it. Let Tesla and Google define the space, create demand for a $50,000 car (the optics and radar at first will be at least a $10K add-on to a base car price, if not more), drive the volumes up to a couple million a year in sales, and drive down the component prices and Apple can come in and establish 'better,' primarily through software and user experience.
And this isn't a phone, where you can impulse buy a one with a credit card for $99... So my guess is Apple will hit the market about 2 years after Tesla and Google sell 300K annually (2020?) .
And the comment about Apple and charging infrastructure... you'll note the iPad was nothing, without iTunes. The iPhone nothing without AppStore.
One big issue with electrics is charging at night, for people who don't own homes... Most apt buildings won't subsidize a couple hundred KVA a month for their renters.
Infrastructure is important.
What Musk and Bezos are doing with spaceflight are ironically not actual moonshots, because the tech and the market is actually well understood.
Musk's riskiest venture is the Tesla, not the spaceship!
The best thing for big companies is establish what business they want to be in, and then be on the lookout for small emerging startups that are working in that business.
Almost all of them will fail, the big players can them just buy out the survivors. Most of Cisco was built that way.
Most of Google's post 1998 successes have been in buying successful startups that they could make even
more successful through their clout (Youtube being the best example of that, but also Android).
There is nothing really wrong with doing this kind of integration work, Apple does it all the time.
Big companies, because they got the money, can reduce risk that way and get the best tech (highly "unfair" to everyone else, but hey that's why big companies stay big).
In fact, what makes Apple great is that they're so good at buying small startups with good IP or talent and then integrating those tech into their own.
Google has not been nearly as good at this kind of thing.
The Iphone was a miracle of integration of various techs that had come of age; that's why it came from Apple and not someone else.
PS: Funny enough, I think Siri is one of their failure in that area. The integration in that case was not done well. I suspect some internal resistance with the Siri team.
As you know Tesla makes a car for consumer's to buy, so it needs to be attractive. Google is developing autonomous software for cars to be built by others and created a platform to use for testing it. Using a cute little non-threatening shell for it is a good move IMO, and certainly gets attention, almost always a plus.