SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Walmart To Test Self-Driving Cars For Grocery Pickup Service
The future is here and soon it will be toting grocery shoppers around Phoenix. Walmart and Waymo — formerly Google's self-driving car project — announced on Wednesday the launch of a pilot program that will allow consumers to make their grocery pickups with the help of an autonomous vehicle.
The plan is simple. Participants in Waymo's "early riders" program will be able to take a driverless shuttle service to and from Walmart whenever they purchase groceries from Walmart.com using the retailer's online grocery pickup service.
Current "early riders" will receive incentives to participate in the pilot and the rides will be provided with no additional cost, Molly Blakeman, a Walmart spokesperson, said in an email to NPR. "Since the pilot is part of our Grocery Pickup program, personal shoppers pick customers' orders and bring them right out to the car ... in this case a Waymo self-driving car," she said.
Related: Google/Waymo Announces Testing of Self-Driving Trucks in Atlanta, Georgia
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 28 2018, @07:52PM (1 child)
A few weeks ago I saw this press release, Waymo purchased 62,000 Pacifica hybrid minivans from Fiat Chrysler and I was wondering where they are all going --
http://www.autonews.com/article/20180531/RETAIL01/180539962/fca-waymo-chrysler-pacifica-hybrid-fleet [autonews.com]
This article even mentions a ride service in Phoenix, so they must have been talking to Walmart for awhile.
These are hybrids which mean they already have a heavy duty electrical system that can be expanded to run the computers and sensors. I'll speculate that FCA and Waymo already worked out a special wiring harness so that the cars are plug-ready for the additional electronics.
Big deal for FCA, this might be about a half-year production of Pacifica at current sales rate, so it's a large order.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday July 28 2018, @08:11PM
Waymo Orders Thousands More Chrysler Pacifica Minivans for Driverless Fleet [soylentnews.org]
Waymo Partners With Jaguar for 20,000 Self-Driving Electric SUVs [soylentnews.org]
I don't think I ever saw the 62k story. If news items like that are becoming routine, they may be getting serious.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]