From Bloomberg: What’s putting the brakes on Google’s self-driving car?
Google is weighing building its own line of self-driving cars independent of the automakers, according to new report by Amir Efrati on JessicaLessin.com. Efrati doesn’t name his sources, but he’s a veteran Google reporter formerly of the Wall Street Journal so I have little reason to doubt them. But it does raise an interesting question: Can a tech company—even one with the resources and innovation drive of Google—build an automobile from scratch?
First, the details of the report: Efrati’s sources said Google is making no headway with the entrenched automakers over partnerships to build self-driving vehicles. So it’s opted to go around them, talking to auto-components designers Continental (CTTAY) and Magna International (MGA) about having them build cars to Google’s design. (German paper Frankfurter Allgemeine also reported Continental has struck a deal with both Google and IBM (IBM).)
