Cruise CEO and co-founder Kyle Vogt proudly announced on April 25 through his Twitter page that the company’s robotaxis fleet is now operational 24/7 across San Francisco.
“Operating robotaxis in SF has become a litmus test for business viability. If it can work here, there’s little doubt it can work just about everywhere. You’ll soon see us open up full operations in other cities.
The capabilities and machine learning systems we’ve built to handle things in SF have proven themselves in many other cities around the world.”
Cruise CEO and co-founder Kyle Vogt
Cruise service hours
CNBC reports that the Cruise robotaxi service opens from 10 pm to 5:30 am for paying customers in the Northwest part of San Francisco.
Meanwhile, there is no fee for those who qualify to use the Cruise robotaxis during the day and in other areas of the city. Along with “Cruisers,” who work for the corporation, they also include a group of riders that Cruise refers to as “power users.” They are public riders who give regular feedback to Cruise.
As usual, Cruise will initially launch this expanded service to employees, followed by the power users and then the public. However, the company has not yet disclosed when it will open it to the general public.
See Also:
- Waymo expands Robotaxi rides to Phoenix Airport amid self-driving tech crisis
- Baidu receives Beijing permit to launch completely driverless robotaxi service
- Feds evaluating Zoox’s self-certified robotaxi following public road deployments
- Motional & Uber launches first public robotaxi services in Las Vegas
- XPeng’s 1024 Tech Day 2022: Autonomous driving, neutral net-based architecture, and robotaxi fleet
There are currently about 240 autonomous cars running simultaneously at night in San Francisco, Phoenix, and Austin, where Cruise is testing or operating its vehicles. Interestingly, most of the Cruise Robotaxis are in San Francisco.
“There are still many challenges ahead for Cruise but this is a milestone worth celebrating.”
Cruise CEO and co-founder Kyle Vogt
Indeed, the company’s driverless service is a significant advancement towards the wider commercial deployment of a long-promised autonomous substitute to ride-hailing services like Uber or Lyft in the United States.
