Insider Transportation: How Uber nearly swiped Google's self-driving crown
Courtesy of David Goldwater
More than three years ago, I decided my day job wasn't enough for me, admitted my social life wasn't much of a sacrifice, and began writing a book about the rise of the self-driving car. Getting my arms around the story required interviewing more than 120 people, sifting through thousands of legal, governmental, and military documents, and making multiple trips to Silicon Valley, Detroit, and Pittsburgh. Really, I had a blast.
This week, I finally published "Driven: The Race to Create the Autonomous Car," my chronicle of how a small band of engineers went from crashing robots in military-focused desert races, to launching Google's ambitious self-driving research project, to sparking a full-fledged industry.
If you're looking for a taste of the story, check out the feature I wrote for Insider, which zeroes in on the destructive rivalry between Google engineers Anthony Levandowski and Chris Urmson. They fought for power, for the direction their team and technology would take, and - embarrassingly - over what kind of buttons their robo-cars should use. And when Levandowski quit in 2016 and decamped for Uber, their conflict morphed into a battle between Larry Page and Travis Kalanick, sparking a bruising legal brawl and ultimately landing Levandowski an 18-month prison sentence.
Read the full story of how Uber nearly swiped Google's self-driving crown right here, get more of the week's transportation news below, and if you haven't yet, sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox every week.
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