Cruise Automation COO Dan Kan (l to r), Cruise Automation CEO Kyle Vogt and General Motors President Dan Ammann Tuesday, November, 20, 2018 at Cruise Automation offices in San Francisco, California.
Source: Noah Berger | General Motors
Cruise, a majority-owned subsidiary of General Motors, plans to begin testing unmanned autonomous vehicles by the end of this year in San Francisco.
The company said Thursday it has received a permit from the California Department of Motor Vehicles to remove the human backup drivers from its self-driving cars.
“Before the end of the year, we’ll be sending cars out onto the streets of SF — without gasoline and without anyone at the wheel,” Cruise CEO Dan Ammann wrote in a Medium post. “Because safely removing the driver is the true benchmark of a self-driving car, and because burning fossil fuels is no way to build the future of transportation.”
Cruise is not the first company to receive such approval but it’s a milestone in taking Cruise’s privately operated fleet to a public level without having drivers — a goal of the company.
