waymo

Waymo, Google's self-driving car unit, has signed a deal to commercialise autonomous vehicle services with the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi Alliance. According to the companies, this new agreement is "exclusive... for an initial period" and will see the partners "explore all aspects" of autonomous vehicle services in France and Japan, including passenger services and cargo delivery.

The Waymo One self-driving taxi service has been given a soft launch in and around Phoenix, Arizona. The service is currently limited to people on the company's Early Rider program. Waymo says it will "gradually roll out [the service] so even more people can ride with us", although it hasn't provided a timeline.

Google's Waymo autonomous driving subsidiary has shown off its new self-driving vehicles by taking members of the public out for a spin. Dubbed 'Early Rider Moments', the short clip shows the reactions of people participating in Waymo's autonomous driving trials. The Chrysler Pacifica test vehicles are completely controlled by the company's array of sensors, radars, and artificial intelligence (AI) systems, without any form of human input from the driver's seat.

Google's Waymo self-driving car division has launched legal action against Uber and its Otto subsidiary, claiming that employees at the ride-sharing company have stolen designs, patent details and other information from the search giant. In a detailed post on Medium about the matter, the allegations by Waymo centre around Anthony Levandowski, who in February 2016 co-founded Otto, an autonomous vehicle technology company that was later bought out by Uber.

Overnight, Google spun off its self-driving car project into a new business division named Waymo, signalling the fact that the tech giant will begin trying to turn its research into a sustainable business. Waymo is said to be contraction of the phrase "way forward in mobility", and is the latest phase in company's autonomous vehicle research, which began back in 2009.