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Uber sells self-driving unit in deal that will push Aurora’s valuation to $10B

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Re: Uber sells self-driving unit in deal that will push Aurora’s valuation to $10B

#171

Post by drcross »

holoduke wrote: post #165
mikesabbagh wrote: post #160

This self-driving system promise keeps getting delayed! It looks to me this is a case of a donkey led by a carrot on a stick (investors are the donkey here). What I never understand is what happens when a new situation that the system did not previously train for happen? what if this situation is deadly? Will all the Uber cars decide to jump off a cliff because of a wrong signalization or bad weather? What will the T…

I am convinced that it takes another 100 to 200 years before we really have smart self driving cars. Maybe it will never happen as I think it will be much more likely that we have self flying drones before long before. Airspace being regulated heavily and thus much more predictable for a machine.

What? 30 years ago we didn't have the internet. 100 years ago there was barely any electricity. Are you insane?

Re: Uber sells self-driving unit in deal that will push Aurora’s valuation to $10B

#172

Post by crazysim »

mlboss wrote: post #138
badestrand wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Check out this video, it works really well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBJ0GvsQeak ("Riding in a Self Driving Car - With Nobody Up Front")

No pedestrians, no roadside construction, no bikes. I would like to see a self driving video in major city during rush hour.

The channel has many videos with pedestrians such as in front of a Costco or busy stores, Waymos encountering weird construction setups sometimes leaving no full lanes available, and might have encountered bikes. Also, there are some during busy times instead of sleepy suburbs though admittedly not New York-levels of crazy.

Re: Uber sells self-driving unit in deal that will push Aurora’s valuation to $10B

#173

Post by sillysaurusx »

drcross wrote: post #171
holoduke wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am convinced that it takes another 100 to 200 years before we really have smart self driving cars. Maybe it will never happen as I think it will be much more likely that we have self flying drones before long before. Airspace being regulated heavily and thus much more predictable for a machine.

What? 30 years ago we didn't have the internet. 100 years ago there was barely any electricity. Are you insane?

No need for the personal swipe!

Re: Uber sells self-driving unit in deal that will push Aurora’s valuation to $10B

#174

Post by beoberha »

bagacrap wrote: post #154
lucasmullens wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hundreds? With Uber there's a car maybe 5-10 minutes away at all times, that's certainly not true with most of their competition.

once self driving arrives, the network effect is a lot less prominent, since the supply side can more easily be scaled

And when are self driving cars going to start driving themselves around and pick people up? Certainly not within 5 years.

Re: Uber sells self-driving unit in deal that will push Aurora’s valuation to $10B

#175

Post by mike_d »

maybeiambatman wrote: post #2

Genuinely wondering - - How a 600 person company will determine who among the 1200 at ATG gets acquihired? - How will the Uber employee unvested stocks get paid out (or not) in an almost no cash deal?

> How will the Uber employee unvested stocks get paid out (or not) in an almost no cash deal?

There are two types of sales that are beneficial to a companies bottom line: selling something of value for cash, and selling a liability for little to no cash.

Uber did the latter of the two. Effectively taking a business unit that was 5-10 years behind Waymo and Cruise and dumping it off on someone who might be able to turn it in to something in exchange for a piece of the future upside. But the real win for Uber shareholders here is that it isn't costing Uber R&D dollars anymore.

Re: Uber sells self-driving unit in deal that will push Aurora’s valuation to $10B

#176

Post by cfontes »

CobrastanJorji wrote: post #100
khazhoux wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of their execs literally pitched me this very vision when I turned Uber down for an eng mgr position several years ago. I thought it was comical that his pitch was "The reason we're going to be successful at Problem 1 (taxis) is because we're going to be successful at ridiculously-difficult Problem 2 (self-driving) which we're not close to solving". Pass.

I love it when job interview pitches fall flat like that. Many years ago, I had a job offer from IBM for a class of server I wasn't familiar with. The guy explained it to me like this: "You see, desktops these days are running Linux, and mainframes are running (IBM OS something?). We represent a class of server bigger than desktops but smaller than mainframes. It's an exciting space. The desktop class of PCs are hand…

As a former IBMer you missed nothing.

IBM is a terrible work place if you are technically inclined, if you are a slime ball of a manager it’s perfect for you.

Re: Uber sells self-driving unit in deal that will push Aurora’s valuation to $10B

#177

Post by ttmb »

stefan_ wrote: post #158
dmix wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And nothing about this deal indicates Uber is stepping away from self driving cars. They basically structured the deal as buying stock in the company and investing $400M. Letting them focus on their core business while still having a large financial stake in AI cars. The big development is that self driving cars turned out to be an extremely hard problem which didn’t match company timelines (or potentially company bu…

What am I even reading. "Nothing indicates Uber is stepping away from self driving cars". Yeah right.

Prior to this deal, Uber had a couple of billion (at the value of this deal) in a self driving car company named ATG. After this deal, they have a couple of billion in a self driving car company named Aurora.

Re: Uber sells self-driving unit in deal that will push Aurora’s valuation to $10B

#178

Post by tintor »

LeoPanthera wrote: post #166
mikesabbagh wrote: post #160

This self-driving system promise keeps getting delayed! It looks to me this is a case of a donkey led by a carrot on a stick (investors are the donkey here). What I never understand is what happens when a new situation that the system did not previously train for happen? what if this situation is deadly? Will all the Uber cars decide to jump off a cliff because of a wrong signalization or bad weather? What will the T…

> What I never understand is what happens when a new situation that the system did not previously train for happen? This happens to human drivers all the time, and humans are really bad drivers even in situations that have happened before. I fully expect AI drivers to be safer than human drivers.

Human drivers can adapt to a new unseen before situation.

Re: Uber sells self-driving unit in deal that will push Aurora’s valuation to $10B

#179

Post by officehero »

holoduke wrote: post #165
mikesabbagh wrote: post #160

This self-driving system promise keeps getting delayed! It looks to me this is a case of a donkey led by a carrot on a stick (investors are the donkey here). What I never understand is what happens when a new situation that the system did not previously train for happen? what if this situation is deadly? Will all the Uber cars decide to jump off a cliff because of a wrong signalization or bad weather? What will the T…

I am convinced that it takes another 100 to 200 years before we really have smart self driving cars. Maybe it will never happen as I think it will be much more likely that we have self flying drones before long before. Airspace being regulated heavily and thus much more predictable for a machine.

There is a push to upgrade road infrastructure with sensors so might be sooner. You're totally right about regulation though - engineers are only solving a "technical" problem, but what about the non-technical ones? Where is the brigade of lobbyists needed to get something like this through legal?

Re: Uber sells self-driving unit in deal that will push Aurora’s valuation to $10B

#180

Post by lhorie »

todd3834 wrote: post #137
lhorie wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't speak for Lyft leadership, but I think Travis and Dara have very different perspectives on self driving. As for the existential threat narrative, consider that there are many places that sell cheaper/better food than McDonalds, and yet, McD is everywhere. I don't think technical merit alone is going to win the rideshare pie.

Cheaper than a $0.39 hamburger? Where?

What currency are you using? In USD, the cheapest item on the menu that I can find (apple slices) goes for $0.57. A big mac combo goes for around $10, while a subway footlong goes for about $7.
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