The Ride-Hail giant, Lyft plans to bring fully autonomous robbery, powered by Mobileye, to the implementation of “just 2026” in Dallas, with more markets to follow, TechCrunch has learned exclusively.
The news comes the day before Lyft reports its financial results in the fourth quarter, coinciding with Waymo’s preparations to launch a Robot Commercial Service with Uber at Austin and later, Atlanta. Tesla has also shared plans to launch an autonomous driving operation in Austin in June.
Marubeni, a Japanese group with fleet management experience, will hold and fund vehicles equipped with mobiles that will appear in the Lyft Ride-Hailing application. While Lyft has not yet disclosed which she works with Carmaker for launch, Advanced Driver Driver technology is already embedded In vehicles from Audi, Volkswagen, Nissan, Ford, General Motors and much more.
Lyft also did not share how many vehicles to start in Dallas to start, but Jeremy Bird, an executive vice president of the driver’s experience, told TechCrunch that the plan is to escalate in thousands of vehicles in many Cities after Texas’ debut.
The Marubeni partnership is a non -follow -up to Lyft: the Japanese company has a subsidiaries in almost every industry, from food and real estate to agriculture and energy, but does not have a large presence in vehicles or autonomous vehicles.
This said, in recent years, Marubeni has begun to dabble. In 2021, the The company worked with Mobileye and the Moovit Transit Design application to launch a custom mobility service in Japan. TechCrunch has arrived to find out if this cooperation is still active.
Mobileye served as an intermediate between Lyft and Marubeni, Bird said. For Lyft’s Lyft business model, finding a partner to commit to fleet ownership is vital.
“Mobileye has the technology and relationship with the OEMs and we have the platform, so it’s the ownership of the missing fleet,” Bird told TechCrunch. “And when you have someone who has experience [fleet management] And the resources and willingness to be a first move, changing the game for us. ”
Marubeni will take advantage of Lyft’s FlexDrive service to help manage its fleet and maintain the utilization of assets. FlexDrive connects drivers who do not have vehicles with car tenants. Bird said the experience of Lyft managing fleets – which includes the charge, cleaning and maintenance of vehicles, as well as real estate for businesses – will largely proceed with the support of future autonomous rides.
Bird noted that Lyft is in talks with every major autonomous automaker to bring them to the platform. The company probably wants to kick these talks on tools, as Archrival Uber Smatches UP has worked with other AV companies. In addition to Waymo, Uber announced the agreements with Wayve, Avride, Serve Robotics, Nuro, Aurora Innovation, Waabi and others.
In addition to the Mobileye deal, Lyft has only announced plans to launch AVS with May Mobility in Atlanta this year.
Lyft’s slowest roll to offer stand -alone route is not for lack of effort. The company had its share of bad luck in the AV arena.
The company has previously worked with Startups Motional and Argo AI to launch Las Vegas Robotax Services – initially with a human security guide behind the steering wheel – but the plan was to go completely without a driver. Motional then stopped the partnership in May after cutting off its workforce and Argo AI closed in 2022. Lyft had a share on Argo and got a $ 135.7 million hit when the company was folded.
Before that, Lyft tried to develop autonomous vehicle technology at home, as did Uber. But both ended up selling their AV units – Uber in Aurora in December 2020, and Lyft on Toyota’s woven planet in April 2021.
Bird acknowledged that Uber’s spree for AV corporate relationships “creates an urgent need” for Lyft, but said it also marks that the development of roboting would not be concentrated with a single company.
He said that Lyft’s goal now is to build steady partnerships with both the companies developing AV Tech and those who want to hold autonomous vehicles, which are aligned with his business model.
“The rest of the value chain is where we really want to play a role, and this is in fleet management, demand creation and market,” Bird said.
Correction: A previous edition of this article reported the previous title of Jeremy Bird in Lyft.
