The ride-hailing company, which is developing driverless taxis in collaboration with self-driving car developers Motional, got the go ahead to test its fleet without drivers back in November. It plans to begin driverless tests in the coming months, with the hope that it can launch to the public in the next few years.<\/p>\n
[Read: Why AI is the future of home security<\/a>]<\/em><\/p>\n Lyft says that it will offer its self-driving taxi service in multiple cities across the US. However, it hasn\u2019t said, or even hinted at, where. Lyft has said that it will take care of the ride-hailing side of things, whilst Motional will take care of managing the fleet of robotaxis.<\/p>\n Chances are that it will be in cities where driving conditions are highly controlled and predictable.<\/p>\n Russia\u2019s Yandex is also developing self-driving cars, and has previously told SHIFT<\/a> that its driverless taxis aren\u2019t far from being launched in areas where it\u2019s easy to predict how other drivers might react in certain situations. However, autonomous vehicles that work in the most complex scenarios are still five years away.<\/p>\n However, Uber recently threw doubt over whether driverless taxis will ever become A Thing when it sold its self-driving division to Aurora<\/a>, a company that is primarily focused on building driverless trucks. Bear in mind, Uber has put $1 billion into developing self-driving cars \u2014 it is not a simple task.<\/p>\n Uber has retained a stake in Aurora and Uber\u2018s CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi, will sit on its board. So it\u2019s not given up entirely, but it seems to indicate that robotaxis might be a more distant future than we have been told. With that in mind, Lyft\u2018s goal of 2023 still seems ambitious at best.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/a>SHIFT<\/a> is brought to you by Polestar. It\u2019s time to accelerate the shift to sustainable mobility. That is why Polestar combines electric driving with cutting-edge design and thrilling performance.<\/span><\/i> Find out how<\/span><\/i><\/a>.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n Published December 17, 2020 \u2014 10:29 UTC <\/p>\n
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