Actual title: Cruise co-founder and CEO Kyle Vogt resigns
Kyle Vogt resigns from Cruise
131–140 of 166 posts
Re: Kyle Vogt resigns from Cruise
#132Since there is so much negativity in this thread, let me balance it with my take as someone who worked at Cruise for 5 years (left 3 years ago). Kyle is the smartest, most technically capable, driven person I have ever had the opportunity to work for. He had a deep technical understanding of the system, a great intuition for unnecessary complexity, and a constant desire to find and resolve engineering bottlenecks. An…
This really seems like a rose colored glasses take. Kyle promoted a move fast and break things culture. When I have talked with Cruise engineers, many of them use that exact phrase, and they are proud of it. That culture ended up breaking a women's face. This in particular > But I hope they can maintain their Silicon Valley culture and not succumb to becoming a complete GM outpost. is the last thing Cruise or the AV…
But the likes of GM do?
https://www.atlantamagazine.com/great-reads/no-accident-insi...
> it meant GM had produced a part that failed to meet not only its own internal minimums for torque but also basic federal safety standards. For all safety-related defects, NHTSA requires auto manufacturers and part suppliers to notify the agency within five business days after learning of a flaw that could lead to an accident. GM had not.
> The documents showed that engineers first noticed the engine stalling problem way back in 2001, four years before Brooke purchased her Cobalt. What’s more, the Cobalt wasn’t the first GM car with a defective switch; that would be the 2003 Saturn Ion. Despite internal probes over the following decade that recommended changes to the key system, no changes were made. Indeed, GM appeared to double down on the bad ignition switch, integrating it into other compact cars, including the Chevy Cobalt, Chevy HHR, Pontiac Solstice, and Pontiac Pursuit.
> As it turned out, DeGiorgio’s 2006 order came four years after an email he wrote to the ignition switch manufacturer, in which he ordered the company, rather than fix the part and incur delays, to “do nothing.” The email was signed “Ray (tired of the switch from hell) DeGiorgio.”
> The report also described the disturbing pattern of disregard for the defect. This could be witnessed in gestures such as the “GM Nod”—in which GM employees affirmed the need for a plan of action, but understood no one actually intended on following through—and the “GM Salute,” described by one employee as the “crossing of the arms and pointing outward towards others, indicating the responsibility belongs to someone else, not me.”
Re: Kyle Vogt resigns from Cruise
#133I’m guessing cruise is pretty much over. What’s really unfortunate is I worked with many people who worked with Kyle and no one had a single good thing to say about him. And I’ve often heard that before with people who knew other CEOs but they kinda grudgingly admitted they did what was needed to get it done. However over and over I just heard phrases like “lost” “aimless” and “confused mess” with Kyle and it never w…
I just do not understand how people can look at a company that has achieved what Cruise has with such pessimism. Successfully completing 250k autonomous rides is an extraordinarily achievement. Yes, there have been problems, but the issues that Cruise is facing today are a world away from the kinds of problems autonomous vehicles were facing even 5 years ago. The fact that there is one major incident being discussed…
For Cruise, manual remote takeover was more common than previously admitted.[1] "Every 4 to 5 miles".
[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2023/11/06/cruise-confirms-robotaxis-re...
Re: Kyle Vogt resigns from Cruise
#134Cruise did exactly the wrong thing by folding under pressure and stopping all operations. Appeasing your critics simply doesn't work. The appeasement alienates your supporters while doing nothing to change the minds of your critics as is amply demonstrated in this thread and elsewhere. Cruise's cars were almost certainly not more dangerous than human driven cars. The CYA bureaucrats have taken over and there is no pl…
[deleted]
Re: Kyle Vogt resigns from Cruise
#135Earlier quoted context omitted.
> And then it was reported they had 1.5 employees per car in operations, requiring support every 2-5 miles. Very surprising given that they've reported a disengagement every 95,000 miles last year. If true that alone should have disqualified them from being street legal.
"Support every 2-5 miles" = having a human on standby to deal with a situation that might soon require human intervention. According to Kyle, speaking as himself on HN, most of these support events don't result in the remote operator doing _anything_.
> most of these support events don't result in the remote operator doing _anything_
That's a utterly ridiculous statistic. If you need a human to monitor to prevent a bad result, it doesn't matter how often the human has to intervene.
For example: With Tesla Autopilot, the driver doesn't have to do anything the vast majority of the time. Still, your life expectancy will be measured in days if you don't monitor it.
Even if the vehicle makes completely random decisions when faced with a binary code, you could still say that 50% of the support events don't result in the remote operator doing anything.
Re: Kyle Vogt resigns from Cruise
#136Earlier quoted context omitted.
> And then it was reported they had 1.5 employees per car in operations, requiring support every 2-5 miles. Very surprising given that they've reported a disengagement every 95,000 miles last year. If true that alone should have disqualified them from being street legal.
"Support every 2-5 miles" = having a human on standby to deal with a situation that might soon require human intervention. According to Kyle, speaking as himself on HN, most of these support events don't result in the remote operator doing _anything_.
The level of trust in the product on display is astounding. And that got shipped?
Re: Kyle Vogt resigns from Cruise
#137Since there is so much negativity in this thread, let me balance it with my take as someone who worked at Cruise for 5 years (left 3 years ago). Kyle is the smartest, most technically capable, driven person I have ever had the opportunity to work for. He had a deep technical understanding of the system, a great intuition for unnecessary complexity, and a constant desire to find and resolve engineering bottlenecks. An…
[dead]
Re: Kyle Vogt resigns from Cruise
#138First Sam Altman, then Kyle Vogt. Is Elon Musk from Twitter/X next?
Re: Kyle Vogt resigns from Cruise
#139To the surprise of no one. This is on the back of GM appointing a Chief Administrative Officer to “work with” the CEO after their recent controversies. One unfortunate accident (though Cruise was at fault for making it worse) has put the entire company in disarray. I suppose it’s the result of accumulation of so many minor issues in San Francisco and a lack of a strict safety culture. It feels like a repeat of Uber f…
> One unfortunate accident I think it was covering up for the accident that caused regulators to pull the plug. If that were traced directly to the CEO, then he's out for good reason. Otherwise, the CEO likely has to take the fall anyway to satisfy regulators who want consequences for executives who don't ensure regulatory submissions are credible.
This^
Trust is very important and if you can't trust your CEO to do the right thing and comply with regulations you haven't got anything.