Lyft is starting to get serious about self-driving cars.
The app-based taxi service is forming a new autonomous vehicle division that will be based in a new center in Palo Alto, the company announced Thursday.
Lyft plans to open the center, dubbed "Level 5" after the term for fully autonomous driving, within the next few weeks. It plans to have several hundred people working in the facility by the end of 2018. The center will have room for vehicle bays, labs, and most importantly, representatives of Lyft's partners in the auto industry.
While some companies are going it alone in developing self-driving cars, Lyft thinks it's a much better idea to team up with other players in the auto and transportation industries and collaborate openly, said Raj Kapoor, Lyft's chief strategy officer, during a press conference Thursday at the company's San Francisco headquarters. Among Lyft's partners are Waymo, Google’s self driving car division; General Motors; nuTonomy, a self-driving car startup out of MIT; and Jaguar Land Rover. Lyft officials also hinted that the company will announce another partnership in the near future.
During the event, Luc Vincent, Lyft's vice president of engineering, detailed the company's plans for its open self-driving car system. Lyft is working on something that resembles a 3D map that will show passengers their car's route, the road ahead, and what the car is seeing around it. The company is hoping the map will help passengers feel more comfortable in — and ceding control to — driverless cars.
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