General Motors (GM) announced today it plans to snap up Cruise Automation, a San Francisco-based startup making sensors that turn regular vehicles into ones that can drive themselves, for an undisclosed sum.
The move is part of a big bet for GM in the driverless car industry as several of the major car manufacturers are now racing to implement this type of technology.
GM recently formed an internal autonomous vehicle development team and entered into a strategic alliance with rideshare service Lyft earlier this year – adding a whopping $500 million to Lyft’s latest funding round to help build a connected network for self-driving cars.
The Cruise acquisition will help further GM’s automation goals. Though Cruise will remain operationally independent, GM President Dan Ammann tells TechCrunch the car maker intends to integrate Cruise’s technology within its fleet of vehicle brands as soon as possible.
“The next step is to make sure we bring the full resources to the table to accelerate what Cruise is doing and integrate into the GM vehicle system,” Ammann said over the phone.
To read more : http://techcrunch.com/2016/03/11/gm-buys-self-driving-tech-startup-cruise-as-part-of-a-plan-to-make-driverless-cars/