Uber self-driving program may be veering off track

Autonomous car experts say company could be pushing too hard

A self-driving car flipped on its side seems guaranteed to make humans think twice about riding with a robot.

Never mind Uber’s accident last weekend in Tempe, Ariz., was the result of a human failing to yield and smacking into the autonomous Volvo. Despite the lack of serious injuries, that image alone raises questions about our acceptance of self-driving tech as well as Uber’s rabid rush to bring this new age of mobility to life.

“We may lose 35,000 people a year to traffic deaths, but if 10 are killed by autonomous cars, we’ll be freaking out,” says Karl Brauer, director of content at Autotrader and Kelley Blue Book.

That it happened to Uber seems to be a bit of bad luck blended with hubris, Brauer adds, noting that in some 2.5 million miles and years of testing the most that has happened to Google’s autonomous cars are lowspeed bumper dings.

“Google has taken the slow and steady approach, and they’re the leader,” he says. “Uber is a company that leverages technology (to connect drivers with riders), but they’re not a tech company. They seem to be frantically transforming themselves into something they’re not by nature.”

Uber responded to a request for comment with confirmation that its cars would be back on the road late Monday in Arizona and Pittsburgh.

John Krafcik, CEO of Alphabet’s veteran self-driving project Waymo, meanwhile, tweeted out a photo Monday of a self-driving car testing in a winter wonderland. “Snow practice!” he wrote, with the location identified as South Lake Tahoe. Testing in inclement weather is considered the Achilles’ heel of autonomous vehicles because their sensors can’t see the road and must rely on highly detailed 3D maps. Waymo seems to be upping the ante just as a rival is struggling.

Uber’s battle against Google’s 7-year-old program is “almost existential,” Gartner auto analyst Mike Ramsey says. “They’re trying so hard, but this can’t be done overnight even if you hire the smartest people in the world.”

All told more than 30 companies large and small are working on the hardware and software components of self-driving cars. Many companies point to 2020 or 2021 as an internal goal for creating a commercially viable autonomous car. But that goal is contingent on other factors, including cohesive federal rules on testing and deployment, agreement on insurance issues and infrastructure needs such as clear lane markings. In that sense, Uber may have egg on its face today, but there is still time to determine the big winners in this lucrative mobility revolution.

“This is transformational stuff, but I’m skeptical it’ll evolve fast,” Ramsey says.

“They seem to be frantically transforming themselves into something they’re not by nature.” Karl Brauer, director of content at Autotrader and Kelley Blue Book, on Uber’s approach to self-driving vehicles