And talking about driving the bus, you won't have to actually drive the bus very long, at least according to Uber. For example, in Pittsburgh, they will be introducing a fleet of self driving automobiles this summer. Max Chafkin is technology reporter for Bloomberg Business Week. You can be followed on Twitter at c H A F K I N. Chafkin. Alright, Chafkin, you're gonna get in one of those autonomous Volvos that
the Uber is going to be presenting in Pittsburgh. I have to tell you I was in one of Uber's self driving cars in Pittsburgh last month as part of the reporting on this story. Um, this is huge news in the world of self driving cars, and I guess more broadly in the in the tech world, which has been sort of uh, you know, vaulting towards this space. Google and Apple of course are both plotting sort of
self driving Uber like services. And what Uber has done, although they are probably not ahead of of Google technologically, they went to market fast and um which has kind of been there their calling card, and and so that's pretty crazy. The other thing that we're reporting in the story that's out today for Business Week is that Uber is buying a company called Auto, which is a driverless truck company that was founded by a number of key members of the Google self driving car, the UM team.
So they're paying something like a little under seven hundred million, we think. UM, so it's really a big coup for for Uber in this kind of race to be first in self driving. Your story notes, of course that Pittsburgh is home to Carnegie Mellon Universities Robotics department, and that Google worked with CMU to get this off the ground. Tell us about that part of the story. So this
is kind of an angle that UM. You know, I don't think everyone realizes, but CMU is like the place to do robotics UH and machine learning research in the United States. UM Sebastian Throne, who was the guy who created the Google self driving car, UM was a professor there. The guy who who was running the Google program and just left, Chris Urmson. Came out of CMU. What Uber did, and this is this was sort of mind blowing in
the world of of academia. Eighteen months ago. Basically went to Pittsburgh and hired forty researchers at CMU and basically one fell swoop shook things up in the in the robotics department, in the robotics field, and UM since then, you know, CMU has has hired new professors that they seem to be doing fine. But Uber has UM, you know, created this pretty impressive team in Pittsburgh that has like
five people. They're also, as we reported in the story, they're opening uh two new offices, one in Palo Alto, one in San Francisco. So we're seeing self driving cars in Pittsburgh, UM, you know starting now or soon uh in next you know, a couple of weeks. Uh, I wouldn't be shocked if we start to see them in Palo Alto and in San Francisco. Max. The cars, these Volvos, these x C nine SUVs. UH, they're made by Volvo. Volvo of course owned by China's Geely Holding a group.
What kind of technology is going into Is this it proprietary or they're using chips? I mean we heard yesterday from Mark Fields, the chief executive Afford uh talking about veladne uh Lighter, the sensor technology company. What goes into these cars? So it's all a little bit fuzzy right now. But let me let me tell you what we know one is that and we reported this today, but Uber Involvo will spend three million dollars together to develop a
base car. Now that car, what I would imagine is it will come out sort of as a Volvo self driving car by one and a Uber Taxi version around the same time. The cars that are out now are basically modified Volvos. And and my I don't know for sure like where the mix of labor is, but I wouldn't be oct if I found out that most of that was happening in Pittsburgh. One interesting thing about this Auto acquisition you bring up light are Auto makes its own lidar. So right now those cars in Pittsburgh are
using I believe Vela dine sensors. But I think one of the things that interesting things about this acquisition is they could probably bring that in house. And I think that's almost certainly what's what they're thinking about. Safety, you know, big concern, especially after the Tesla UH driver was killed
hitting a truck. Yeah, and and it's it's important to say that first of all, with the pilot program, their safety drivers in the cars, there are also co pilots who are sitting there taking notes everything that happens in the car is recorded, um, which is a little uh, I mean, you know different, um. Uh. The other thing is And this is something that Tesla has argued and
I think uber Um will argue as well. There's a belief that not too long from now, it's going to become clear that these things are safe and and so and so, even though there are a few accidents, regulators will come on board. Well, Max Chaffkin, Uh, I know you're so glad you're gonna be tracking a force and riding those self driving cars before I do. I want to make sure they're safe before I hop on board. Without those human monitors. Humans aren't safe either. There you go,
Max Chaffkin. Hey, I'm a great driver technology reporter for Bloomberg Business Week. I'm Kathleen Hayes along with Pim Fox. This is Bloomberg