Waymo and Hyundai have agreed to a deal that integrates Ioniq SUVs into Waymo's fleet.
Alphabet-owned robotaxi company Waymo on Friday announced it had agreed to terms with popular automaker Hyundai on a “multi-year partnership” that will see Hyundai’s all-electric Ioniq 5 SUV be the beneficiary of Waymo’s autonomous driving technology, now in its sixth generation. In its blog post, Waymo says the vehicles will be added to its existing fleet—comprised of Jaguar SUVs—on the road “over time.”
Manufacturing will happen at the new Hyundai Motor Group Metaplant America electric vehicle manufacturing facility in Georgia, according to Waymo. Initial testing of the Ioniq fleet will begin by late next year, with the cars being available to Waymo One riders “in the years to follow.”
“We are thrilled to partner with Hyundai as we further our mission to be the world’s most trusted driver,” said Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana in a statement. “Hyundai’s focus on sustainability and strong electric vehicle roadmap makes them a great partner for us as we bring our fully autonomous service to more riders in more places.”
The news of the Waymo × Hyundai partnership should serve as a reminder of how autonomous vehicle technology is a transformative technology in terms of accessibility. I can only speak to my own experiences, but having had access to the Waymo One app here in San Francisco for what feels like forever, I can attest without any equivocation whatsoever that using Waymo to get around town has been an utter game-changer. There are multiple layers to my affinity for Waymo, the most important being that, as a nerdy person, I’m entirely comfortable with trusting the technology and riding in a vehicle without a human driver sitting behind the wheel. The reality is a big part of my willingness to be open-minded comes from a place of desperation.
As a lifelong disabled person whose low vision precludes me from ever getting a driver’s license, it means I’ve been forced to throw myself at the mercy of family and friends—not to mention public transit and my own two feet—and hope they love me enough to effectively be my personal chauffeur. In absolute terms, I know many people in my orbit who will take me anywhere I need to go in a nanosecond, and I’m appreciative for the support, but it belies the point. The salient point is having to rely on the kindness of others for rides (or anything else, for that matter) oftentimes makes me feel like a burden. I don’t want to bother people in doing my bidding, and I really don’t want to be an inconvenience by taking precious time away from their already crazy-busy schedules.
This strikes at the heart of the real appeal of Waymo for me. Sure, it’s cool technology, but the more pressing point is these autonomous vehicles, available to me 24/7 with a few taps on my new iPhone, means I can go where I want to go on my own terms. Waymo affords agency and autonomy to the legions of other disabled people, here in San Francisco and elsewhere where service is open, to travel independently and be self-sufficient. Every disabled person, regardless of how capable they are, always will need assistance of some kind and always will need to be taken care of to various degrees. That’s merely a reflection of how we live in a society literally unbuilt for our needs. Alexander Graham Bell didn’t invent the telephone with a bunch of accessibility features, after all. I’m reminded of what Lana Nieves told me in an interview last year when she said, in part, that, like me, she refuses to feel beholden to other people for transport. Nieves, who works as executive director at the Independent Living Resource Center of San Francisco, was adamant in telling me she “isn’t a child” while pointedly adding “if I want to go somewhere alone, why shouldn’t I be able to go somewhere alone?”
She continued: “Why shouldn’t any adult with a disability go somewhere alone if they want to? If this [Waymo] technology helps make that possible for a wider group of people than just people without disabilities—who can walk to the car and see where they’re going—why shouldn’t it be as widely available and as accessible as possible?”
Safety and software readiness are both valid reasons for skepticism, but the anti-robotaxi brigade here in San Francisco have tunnel vision in this regard. The powers-that-be at City Hall show no recognizance whatsoever of the also equally valid fact that Waymo is a life-altering good for disabled San Franciscans like me. For all the Waymo cars being set ablaze in Chinatown, not to mention people having sex in Cruise cars, it’s the negative press that makes all the headlines and reaches all the eyeballs. By comparison, a pittance is seemingly paid to how Waymo is a literal vehicle for empowerment because, stripped to the core, to ignore what disabled people think shows mostly nobody cares about how the disability community lives their lives and, by extension, uses technology.
Today’s word that Waymo and Hyundai have gotten together is yet another poignant reminder that autonomous vehicles matter a lot—especially to the lives of mobility-challenged disabled people like me.
