Ford Motor Co is taking a diverse approach from rival General Motors Co in deploying self-driving cars, focusing initially on partnering with and operating vehicles for a variety of companies, from Domino’s Pizza to Lyft, executives revealed.
Ford said on Tuesday it has launched a pilot delivery program in Miami with Domino‘s and next month will add goods delivery startup Postmates.
The automaker said it is developing a revenue-sharing model with its partners, for whom it will provide fleet-management services.
The company’s business model is different from the one being developed by GM, which last fall said it would launch its own commercial ride sharing service with self-driving vehicles in 2019.
Ford plans to provide a self-driving vehicle service to multiple partners, who in turn would offer it to their customers under their own brand names. A Lyft customer, for instance, could schedule a ride from a Lyft mobile phone app in a Ford self-driving vehicle.
Jim Farley, president of Ford Global Markets, said the company is designing a unique self-driving vehicle from the ground up, which it intends to begin producing in 2021.
The vehicle will be flexible enough to carry people, goods or both, and will be powered by a hybrid gasoline-electric powertrain to provide good range and minimize the downtime required by pure electric vehicles such as GM’s Cruise AV to charge their batteries.
Culled from Reuters
