Report: Google Partners With Ford To Make Self-Driving Cars (yahoo.com)

An anonymous reader writes: A new report from Yahoo Autos says Google and Ford plan to announce a partnership to build self-driving cars. "By pairing with Google, Ford gets a massive boost in self-driving software development; while the automaker has been experimenting with its own systems for years, it only revealed plans this month to begin testing on public streets in California. Google has 53 test vehicles on the road in California and Texas, with 1.3 million miles logged in autonomous driving. By pairing with Ford, the search-engine giant avoids spending billions of dollars and several years that building its own automotive manufacturing expertise would require. Earlier this year, Google co-founder Sergey Brin said the company was looking for manufacturing partners that would use the company's self-driving system, which it believes could someday eliminate the roughly 33,000 annual deaths on U.S. roads." Automotive News reported on the same plans independently, saying, "It isn't clear whether Ford would design a purpose-built vehicle for Google or supply a standard production car fitted with the sensors and computers that the car needs to guide itself down the road."

Comments

What Google gets

[Anonymous Coward]

- Political clout. Ford has plants in many states, and a network of dealerships in every state. And many loyal truck and car owners who vote.

Anything else? Well I did mention the network of dealerships, right.

Re:Already being done

[Kjella]

There's a few practical considerations:
1) They're operated by professionals. I have a relative that is a long haul driver here in Norway, here's some of the differences:
a) Far more rigorous training to drive a truck than my car
b) Health cerificate (otherwise only drivers above 70)
c) More frequent renewal
d) Rest periods verified by electronic meter
e) Can not drink alcohol up to 24 hours before driving
f) Maximum speed is capped to 90-100 km/h depening on class
g) Far more frequent road checks of papers, technical condition and securing of cargo

2) Pilots, bus drivers, train drivers and so on have a responsibility for a lot of lives. Most of them take it very seriously and act professionally.

3) We only need a small fraction of the population to be professional drivers, if it's not right for you there's plenty of other occupations.

Regular cars on the other hand is operated by almost everyone, which tells you the requirements aren't all too high. And we have a lot of people who might be qualified drivers if they were sober, rested and paying attention but just drive when they shouldn't. Or our health is failing and the car is our lifeline to getting around, so we refuse to give it up. And ultimately we as a society depend on cars, so we don't really want to put the thumbscrews on the requirements or punishments. So the potential for improvement is far greater.