GM to shut down Cruise

After a $10 billion investment, GM has decided to abandon its Cruise robotaxi development service given the considerable time and resources that would be needed to scale the business, along with an increasingly competitive robotaxi market. Just over a year ago, GM said it will reduce spending at Cruise.

In a statement, the carmaker said that it plans to realign its autonomous driving strategy and prioritize development of advanced driver assistance systems on a path to fully autonomous personal vehicles. GM will build on the progress of Super Cruise, the company’s hands-off, eyes-on driving feature, now offered on more than 20 GM vehicle models and currently logging over 10 million miles per month.

GM intends to combine Cruise and GM technical teams.

“GM is committed to delivering the best driving experiences to our customers in a disciplined and capital efficient manner. Cruise has been an early innovator in autonomy, and the deeper integration of our teams, paired with GM’s strong brands, scale, and manufacturing strength, will help advance our vision for the future of transportation.” – Mary Barra, chair and CEO of GM.

“As the largest U.S. automotive manufacturer, we’re fully committed to autonomous driving and excited to bring GM customers its benefits – things like enhanced safety, improved traffic flow, increased accessibility, and reduced driver stress.” – Dave Richardson, senior vice president of software and services engineering.