Uber has a pitch for autonomous automobile makers: we obtained this.
The ride-hailing and meals supply firm has launched a brand new division referred to as Uber Autonomous Options designed to tackle all of the duties related to working a robotaxi, self-driving truck, or sidewalk supply robotic enterprise, together with software program and help providers.
The initiative, introduced Monday, formalizes what Uber has been not so quietly engaged on for a number of years now.
Uber has amassed partnerships with practically two dozen autonomous automobile expertise firms throughout each use case, from robotaxis and trucking to sidewalk supply robots and drones. Uber has backed many of those firms — Lucid and Nuro, Waabi, and China’s WeRide — invested $100 million to construct fast-charging, autonomous-vehicle charging stations, and even launched Uber AV Labs, a specialised engineering group that can collect information for robotaxi companions.
Uber has made the partnerships and investments; now it needs to make itself indispensable.
“AV tech groups ought to be capable of deal with what they do greatest: constructing software program that may safely energy an autonomous world,” stated Sarfraz Maredia, Uber’s world head of autonomous mobility and supply, who can be main the initiative. The thought, he stated, is so as to add “operational depth wherever they want it,” together with demand era, rider expertise, buyer help, or managing the day-to-day fleet operations.
The tip aim is to assist these firms cut back their prices per mile and enhance the velocity to market. Uber stated it plans to assist these companions scale robotaxi deployments to more than 15 cities by the end of this year.
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June 9, 2026
“What’s going to find out the success or failure of autonomous on the planet is whether or not it may be commercialized, and Uber goes to be the factor that makes autonomy commercially viable,” Uber President and COO Andrew MacDonald stated.
For Uber which means dealing with infrastructure like coaching information and mapping, fleet financing, regulatory providers, and managing how robotaxis and different AVs navigate advanced occasions and venues. The corporate stated it’s utilizing a fleet of specifically geared up Lucid autos to gather information that may be shared with companions to allow them to prepare their AI methods.
The brand new division additionally plans to sort out person expertise, together with buyer help. Notably, Uber needs to take over fleet administration, which would come with distant help — a difficulty that just lately obtained consideration from federal lawmakers over considerations Waymo makes use of employees abroad. Fleet administration would additionally cowl insurance coverage and using the people who would possibly must help these AVs after they’re out on the planet.
Uber’s transfer is each existential and opportunistic. The corporate offered its in-house AV growth unit often known as Uber ATG in 2020, following two years of inside struggles and stress after one in every of its take a look at autos killed a pedestrian. (Uber offered off the division in a advanced cope with Aurora.)
It has tried to shore up its place by way of partnerships and investments. And there have been lots. Uber and Waymo have a shared robotaxi service in Atlanta and Austin. The corporate has additionally locked up partnerships with Chinese language corporations Baidu, Momenta, and Pony.ai, sidewalk supply bot firms Cartken, Starship, and Serve, and the U.Ok.-based automated driving tech startup Wayve, in addition to robotaxi builders AVride and Motional, to call a number of. It has plans to launch a robotaxi service with Volkswagen in Los Angeles by the tip of 2026 — though it received’t be driverless till 2027.
These do present Uber with some safety, but it surely doesn’t present a substitute to any income misplaced if these firms erode its personal ride-hailing and meals supply enterprise that’s right this moment powered by human drivers. Uber is hoping this new division will.
