GM shifts focus of Cruise autonomous driving from robotaxis to personal vehicles

Dec. 11 (UPI) -- General Motors will no longer individually fund its Cruise autonomous robotaxi division, instead folding it into its broader tech team.

Instead, GM said Tuesday it will focus on autonomous vehicles for personal use rather than ride-sharing.

"Cruise was well on its way to a robotaxi business -- but when you look at the fact you're deploying a fleet, there's a whole operations piece of doing that," Mary Barra, General Motors CEO, said on Tuesday, according to CNBC.

GM had spent more than $10 billion on making Cruise a robotaxi service, but the auto giant cited a more competitive market in that sector along with its own spending priorities for making the move.

Cruise, a San Francisco-based autonomous vehicle startup, was acquired by GM in 2016. GM currently owns 90% of the company. Cruise founder Kyle Vogt had soured on GM, leaving the company in November 2023.

"In case it was unclear before, it's clear now: GM [is] a bunch of dummies," Vogt said on X Tuesday.

Barra said GM will coordinate with current Cruise CEO Marc Whitten and its other executives in restructuring Cruise's operations and how many of its workers will now join GM.

"Over the past year we've been assessing our self-driving strategy," GM's Chief Financial Officer Paul Jacobson said, according to the Detroit Free Press. "The better use is to pursue improvements to L3 and ultimately in L4 in a personal model because that's more aligned with the capital and working needs of the business going forward."