Not a Surprise

Argo AI, a joint venture of Ford and Volkswagen dedicated to developing self driving cars, is shutting down operations, because they have determined that self-driving is not technically feasible at this time.

This has been abundantly clear for a few decades that the claims of self-driving cars are so much humbug.

Much like fusion power, self driving has been a decade away for decades:

Argo AI, a self-driving vehicle group jointly backed by Ford and Volkswagen, is abruptly shutting down operations after six years of development.

Establishing fully driverless technology that is profitable and scalable would cost billions of dollars and take at least half a decade, John Lawler, chief financial officer at Ford, said as the company reported results on Wednesday.

“We’ve looked at this every way you can,” he said. “And we just see the profitability . . . a long way out.”

The shutdown follows years of consolidation as Uber, Lyft and others have thrown in the towel upon realising that the dream of robotaxis is more distant than the industry had envisioned five years ago, when big sums of money flowed to small start-ups, and major automakers feared that their business model was at risk.

………

Meanwhile, industry leaders Cruise, owned by GM, and Alphabet’s Waymo were last valued at $30bn and continue to expand efforts in multiple cities.

Yeah, valued at $30 billion the same way that WeWork was, with venture capital, particular Masayoshi Son's SoftBank Corp bidding up the value, and then getting out before the house or cards collapses.

Once again, we don't get self-driving cars, but the VC's make their vig, and the ordinary investor is left holding the bag.