Uber Self-Driving Trucks Are Now Moving Cargo For Uber Freight Customers (techcrunch.com)

Uber's autonomous trucks are now being put to work via Uber Freight, Uber's commercial cargo shipping on-demand app. "The first runs are being done in Arizona, with regular hauls operating with both human drivers and autonomous trucks working in tandem," reports TechCrunch. From the report: How it works is that Uber will load up the freight on a conventional, human driven truck who collects the load from the shipper and then does a short haul run to a transfer hub. The short haul truck then loads its cargo onto a long-haul freight transport, which is autonomous for the purposes of these trips. That self-driving test truck handles the highway driving for the longer portion of the trip, handing it off once again to a human-driven trip for the short haul cap to the overall journey. Uber Freight handles the load sourcing, just as it dos for connecting shippers with regular human truckers. Uber's Advanced Technology Group is simply deploying its self-driving trucks on the Uber Freight platform, in the same way that the autonomous team within Uber is using the Uber ride-hailing network to test and deploy its self-driving ride share vehicles. Uber has released a video depicting this journey.

Comments

Re:I hate Uber but..

[rtb61]

Never ever be confused by the difference between lower costs and lower charges, one hardly ever leads to the other and that is the purposeful function of public relations and marketing, the ability to confuse the gullible. Corporations charge the maximum they can only limited by diminishing returns with higher profit margins, the cost versus the charges. Ideally as seen in modern governance, they want tax payers to foot the bill for the costs and then charge infinite profit margins, infinite because say like the F35 Flying Pig, the final purchase leads to the goal of the aircraft being declared unsatisfactory, blame government controlled by those corporations and buying a new replacement (they seem to be pushing the M$ model where every second version is utter trash requiring replacement at your cost).

The modern trend if for more skilled drivers, that place their equipment appropriate after getting it to site safely and then unloading it themselves to the right location. Auto trucks at this stage, lets be economically honest, are an IPO tool, to make the company look like it is worth more than it is.

Always keep in mind the cargo will often be worth more than the truck and not just the cargo itself but delays in delivery. All sorts of things can stop an auto truck cold, one detector slightly faulty and someone's cargo is dead on the side of a road, depending how far away, that can mean dead for days and delays can cost way, way more than a truck driver. How well does autodrive work in muddy conditions, where there is a high likelihood of obscuring detectors and if not mud how about snow.

Any perceived saving, after already adding in higher capital cost, can be goobled right up in penalties for lost cargo and if the turkey vultures at Uber think they can scam commercial operators like they do the gullible public, well, they will be bankrupted into oblivion via civil suits. In commercial cargo operations it is all about the cargo, undamaged and on time, no whoops star rating, straight to court rating and clauses like, we take no responsibility for safe delivery of cargo, blacked out by highlighter and initialled or the contract binned.

Uber makes new announcement to pretty up company prior to IPO, believe nothing.