Emily Bary
Last week’s fatal pedestrian crash involving a self-driving Uber Technologies vehicle isn’t stopping rival Waymo, a unit of Alphabet Inc., from forging ahead with its own autonomous-driving efforts.
Waymo announced Tuesday a new premium electric fully self-driving car, called the I-Pace, in partnership with Jaguar Land Rover. Waymo said it would add 20,000 I-Pace vehicles to its fleet within the first two years of production.
The company said it would launch a fully self-driving service in Phoenix this year, through which members of the public will be able to take the cars anywhere in the company’s service area. The initial business model will be ride-hailing. Waymo also has self-driving sedans, minivans, and Class 8 semi trucks.
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Shares of Alphabet GOOGL, -1.86% which is also the parent of Google, fell 0.9% in midday trading Tuesday, but have rallied 25% over the past 12 months, while the S&P 500 index SPX, -0.04% has gained 14% the past year.
At a launch event in New York, Waymo Chief Executive John Krafcik fielded media questions, with many focusing on the fatal Uber crash in Arizona last week. On Monday, Arizona Governor Doug Ducey ordered Uber to suspend testing of autonomous vehicles on public roadways in the state.
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Krafcik said that Waymo has “the focus of creating world’s most experienced driver,” a reference to the learnings that Waymo’s newly announced I-Pace cars and others in the unit’s fleet accumulate as they log more miles.
“We’ll continue to put our focus on safety,” Krafcik said. “It is the overwhelming, number-one priority for the team at Waymo.” Members of the press received copies of Waymo’s safety report upon arrival.
In response to a question about whether the Uber crash was a setback for the industry, Krafcik said he was confident in the company’s technology and added that he wants the new I-Pace to be a “very safe benchmark for the world.”
He also directed reporters to his prior comments on the Uber crash. Over the weekend, Krafcik said at an industry event that he thought Waymo’s cars “would be robust and able to handle situations like that,” according to the Wall Street Journal, in reference to Uber’s collision.
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Though the Uber in question had a human employee in the car, the cars Waymo showed off didn’t feature employees with the ability to take over the steering wheel.