Tuesday, March 27, 2018

Arizona Suspends Uber's Self Driving Vehicle Testing

Arizona Governor Doug Ducey has formally suspended Uber's self driving vehicle privileges in that state in the wake of the death of a pedestrian, killed by an Uber self-driving vehicle. According to Ducey, the death was an "unquestionable failure" to comply with the expectation that public safety would be a top priority for those operating self-driving cars. The shift comes as others in the self-driving car industry, including Intel's MobileEye self driving car unit, have said that Uber's systems should have detected the pedestrian earlier, in enough time to brake and prevent the death. The move is a major shift in position for Ducey, who has been a huge proponent of Uber's self driving vehicle efforts, with few, if any regulations on their testing. Ducey had just issued an order which would let Uber and others test their self-driving vehicles on the road without a safety driver.