The Cruise Origin is a driverless electric van manufactured by GM for use by its robotaxi subsidiary.
Cruise suspended all activities two weeks ago after the California DMV revoked its operating license.
This is the result of a number of incidents that have involved Cruise vehicles.
Cruise has been in the news quite a lot recently due to its autonomous vehicles causing all sorts of problems on San Fransisco roads, and now, parent company General Motors is pausing the production of the Cruise Origin robotaxi.
Since it was granted a permit to operate autonomous ride-hailing services in San Fransisco back in 2021, the company has been embroiled in a number of incidents such as unexpected stops that blocked intersections, crashes with other vehicles, and even crashes with pedestrians.
Following the latest incident, where a cruise robotaxi collided with a pedestrian that had been thrown in its way by another vehicle and then proceeded to drag her for a short distance before finally coming to a rest, the California DMV revoked the company’s permit.
Investigations into Cruise also found issues with the company’s detection software, which reportedly had trouble identifying small children and holes in the road, thus putting both pedestrians and passengers at risk.
In response to this, as well as mounting pressure from local politicians and San Fransisco residents, Cruise decided to temporarily suspend all activities in order to regain the public’s trust.
Due to this, General Motors will now pause the production of the Cruise Origin driverless shuttle which was set to replace the company’s current modified Chevrolet Bolt robotaxis starting this year in the United States, and from 2026 in Japan.
According the Cruise’s CEO, hundreds of units of the Origin have already been produced and the automaker is ready to scale up production as soon as more vehicles are needed.
Despite this setback, both Cruise and General Motors continue to believe autonomous vehicles are the way forward and that the Origin robotaxi is a viable product that will have a big impact on transportation within cities over the coming years.
Source: Forbes
