
Uber Expands Driverless-Car Push with Deal for 24,000 Volvos - prando
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-20/uber-steps-up-driverless-cars-push-with-deal-for-24-000-volvos
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greenyoda
Extensive discussion a few days ago:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15741019](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15741019)

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Fricken
I'm not in Pittsburgh or any of the places where people are taking rides in
Uber's autonomous test vehicles, but from a few YouTube videos it appears they
can't get more than a few blocks in urban traffic without needing human
intervention. They've been at it for about 2.5 years now, not including the
work that was inherited from the CMU robotics department.

I think if a company can program and train an autonomous vehicle to reliably
go 5 or 10 miles in city traffic, then it's an indicator they've got the
genius level problems solved. Safety validation is a whole other ball game,
labour intensive but not super difficult.

A few companies have passed that benchmark. There are others who, in spite of
being ambitious and well-capitalized, and having had a few years to incubate,
appear to be painting by numbers, and don't seem to know what to do when the
instruction manual runs out of instructions.

Talent is the big X factor in this race and not everybody's got it. Do you
think Uber will be ready to receive another 24,000 Volvo's on top of the ~200
they've got somewhere in the 2019/2020 timeframe?

I'm not betting on it.

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chinathrow
To give some perspective about these numbers: currently there are 13,587
medaillons in NYC alone.

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DeusExMachina
It's hard to compare the numbers though. Autonomous cars work 24/7, so you
definitely need fewer to provide the same coverage as human taxis.

How efficient it will be though, we still don't know.

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DrScump
Medallion cabs (leased by the owner to other drivers) are generally worked all
shifts that fares can be found.

