TECH

The Alphabet affiliate is the first company to receive permission from the state of California to try self-employed cars without a driver

Waymo, Alphabet's freestanding car subsidiary, is the first company to receive permission from the California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) to test its stand-alone vehicles without a backup driver in the front seat, the company on Tuesday.The company will be able to use some three dozen non-driver test cars behind the wheel in parts of Mountain View, Sunnyvale, Los Altos, Los Altos Hills and Palo Alto. Waymo said that the tests will be carried out in vehicles.Waymo's permit includes day and night tests on city streets, country roads and highways with established speed limits of up to 104.6 kilometers per hour. According to the company, their cars can handle safely in fog and light rain, which they are also allowed.According to the company, if one of your cars faces a situation that does not understand, it stops in a safe place until you understand how to proceed. "For our cars, that means following well-established protocols, which include getting in touch with Waymo's fleet and passenger support to get help solving the problem," the company explained, adding:Security is the core of Waymo's mission. Our vehicles undergo rigorous testing that begins well before reaching the road. In addition to those 10 million miles on public roads, our auto-driving system has learned to handle nearly 7 trillion miles of simulated miles.As part of the deal, the company is required to continuously monitor the status of its cars and provide bilateral communication with passengers, as well as having at least $ 5 million in insurance and notifying local communities when they extend their testing to such locations.
The members of the Waymo team will be the first passengers of these tests and, eventually, the company will allow external people to make these trips in their cars. The company has been conducting this type of car test without backup drivers in Arizona and has said it plans to launch a commercial service in the state by the end of 2018.


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