Google building Uber rival with driverless car technology: Report

Uber, the app based transportation company, has been going through some interesting times of late. While it grows in stature, it has faced legal issues in many parts of the world including India (Delhi); it faces competition on many fronts. In India, services like Ola and Meru have kept it on its toes and in the US, a service called Lyft threatens it.
However, it has always had strong backers and it never really has gone up against a global giant. Most of its competition has come from start-ups and local players. This is set to change, if a Bloomberg Business report is to be believed.
A report by the publication believes that Google and Uber could be "ferocious competitors" in the near future. In the past, they have been like allies. Google's venture capital arm, Google Venture's, back in 2013, invested $258 million in Uber, which at the time was the largest amount the firm had invested. A year later, it poured in more money into Uber.

 

 

Google's Chief Legal Officer and SVP of corporate development, David Drummond is a member of Uber's board. Reportedly, Drummond has shown Uber executives a screenshot of a Google ride sharing app. The Uber board is exploring possibilities and may consider asking Drummond to resign from his post on the board.

The ride-sharing app is expected to work in tandem with Google's much talked about driverless car project. The driverless car project is part of Google X, the search giant's 'moonshot' division, which sees the active involvement of co-founder Sergey Brin.
In addition, Google recently announced that its now contextual assistant is integrating third party apps. These also include services like Lyft and Meru cabs, which compete with Uber. Uber conspicuously is absent.
Uber, itself, is said to be working on its own driverless car project. Silicon Valley based tech blog; TechCrunch recently reported that Uber is teaming up with Carnegie Mellon University for a research facility in Pittsburg, to develop autonomous vehicles.
Google for its part is heavily invested in driverless car technology. Reportedly, Google is working on a technology where a user could just call up a vehicle and tell it to take him/her to the destination.
It is not only Google, but now big-ticket car manufacturers are also getting into this space. Mercedes, Audi, Tesla, amongst other have all claimed that they are working on driverless car technologies. Mercedes, in fact, at the 2015 Consumer Electronics Show, unveiled a radical autonomous car prototype.
Google can also leverage Uber's dependence on its maps technology. Right now, Uber's app uses Google's Maps technology. While there are alternatives for Uber, Google's technology remains one of the most sophisticated options.
Lastly, Google also has the platform advantage. Its Android operating system powers the majority of the smartphones in the world. As Google controls the platform, it could very well preload and bundle its own service as a part of the OS.
Google is known to do such things. While, the Android OS itself is open source, smartphone and tablet manufacturers are required to adhere to certain terms so that they get access to Google's Play Store, cloud services, and apps. Products, which do not adhere to these terms lack Google's popular services and app store. These products have often failed in the market.

Read more at: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/google-uber-rival-driverless-car-technology-autonomous-ride-sharing/1/416674.html

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