u/diplomat33

As an owner of a Model 3 with AI3 hardware, this makes me happy!

"Robotaxis with nobody at the wheel are real, scaling, and stuck inside a handful of cities. The 'self-driving' car you can actually buy still needs you. Where autonomous driving really stands in 2026, and why the holdup isn't the technology."

Key Updates to FMVSS No. 135

• Removes requirements for hand- or foot-operated brake controls for vehicles designed never to be operated by a human. Existing rules still apply to AVs that retain manual controls.
• All subject vehicles must still meet the same stopping distance performance criteria via alternative testing procedures.
• While this update ensures AVs can physically stop when commanded, NHTSA is separately developing safety performance requirements for AVs in real-world driving scenarios.
• NHTSA will continue to use its broad defect enforcement authority to investigate unsafe ADS behavior and oversee recalls.

UN Economic Commission for Europe’s (UNECE) World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulations adopted a new framework for AV safety:

• The regulations require manufacturers to implement audited safety management systems covering the full life cycle of an automated driving system.
• Moreover, manufacturers must ensure test environments, including virtual testing tools, meet strict credibility criteria and demonstrate that their ADS poses no unreasonable risk.
• Manufacturers must conduct continuous performance monitoring and reporting so that the real-world performance of automated vehicles can be assessed after deployment.
• Vehicles also must be equipped with a data storage system for automated driving, ensuring that safety-relevant data is recorded and available for oversight.
• The regulation requires automatic driving performance to match or exceed that of a competent human driver, UNECE said.
• Because an ADS will handle all driving tasks, which includes steering, accelerating, decelerating and signalling, manufacturers must demonstrate “robust design, validation and compliance with traffic rules through simulation, track testing, and real‑world trials”.
• The regulation has support from major auto markets, including Canada, China, European Union, Japan, United Kingdom and the United States.
• It is expected to enter into force in roughly one month.

• Stellantis, Wayve, and Uber are collaborating to develop and deploy L4 driverless mobility services
• By combining Stellantis’ world-class vehicle L4-Ready Platforms™, Wayve’s advanced AI Driver, and Uber’s leading mobility network, the companies seek to accelerate the global rollout of robotaxi services
• This strategic relationship builds on the companies’ existing collaborations together and reinforces a growing industry consensus that the most efficient way to scale autonomous mobility is through a powerful ecosystem

At AutoTech Detroit, Mobileye VP of Business Development Nimrod Brickman shares perspectives on the rapid rise of hands-free driving and what it takes to bring L2+ systems to scale.

"Uber, Nuro, and Lucid, today announced Houston as the second planned market for their robotaxi program, following the San Francisco Bay Area launch later this year. The companies expect to launch the service in Houston in mid-2027 exclusively through the Uber network, with plans to expand the service to dozens of additional markets over the coming years."

"Mobileye today announced plans to expand its robotaxi activities beyond supplying self-driving technology and into full ownership of an autonomous ride-hailing business. The new initiative, set to launch in a U.S. city in 2027, marks a significant evolution of Mobileye's strategy, combining its industry-leading autonomous driving capabilities with fleet operations, rider services, and mobility management into a single vertically integrated offering. The effort adds to Mobileye’s existing business model as a supplier of autonomous-driving technology to automakers and mobility providers worldwide, creating a new operating business while continuing to support customer deployments."

Waymo on X: "Today we’re announcing our latest fleet partnership with Element Fleet Management as we continue to optimize our commercial operations at scale. This collaboration will provide end-to-end operational services for our vehicles, beginning with an initial deployment in San Diego and expanding to additional markets over time."

Overall, he seemed to like the vehicle with the extra leg room and nice screens but experienced some phantom braking and indecisiveness with the self-driving itself. Keep in mind that these are just first impressions.

This seems really smart to me because it will give Waymo guaranteed monthly recurring revenue as they scale. And $29.99/month seems very reasonable to me for the benefits you get, especially if you are a heavy Waymo user.

Waymo published a paper detailing their new model for simulating how a competent human driver avoids a collision: "ReD expands upon these capabilities to model the full closed-loop cognitive process. ReD simulates how a careful and competent human driver updates their beliefs as a situation evolves, manages uncertainty about other road users' intentions, and selects the evasive maneuver, whether that is braking, swerving, or a combination of both."

From CEO Alex Kendall on X: "Exciting news to kick off London Tech week: Londoners can now sign up to experience u/wayve_ai autonomous rides on u/Uber which are launching soon (pending final regulatory approval)."

Alpamayo 2:

• 3x parameter scale: Alpamayo 2 Super scales to 32B parameters (compared to previous 10B-parameter generations), improving reasoning, 3D spatial understanding and trajectory prediction in long‑tail scenarios.
• Full-surround perception: Expands from front-focused cameras to 360-degree situational awareness across front, side and rear views, giving the model complete context for safer lane changes, merges and intersection crossing.
• Meta-Actions: Adds Meta-Action outputs — macro actions such as yield, lane change and stop — so the model predicts high-level driving decisions for downstream planning in addition to trajectories and chain-of-causation (CoC) traces.
• Reasoning auto-labeling and 2D grounding: Introduces reasoning auto‑labeling with 2D grounding so the foundation model can provide high-quality reasoning labels, accelerating data annotation cycles.
• State-of-the-art performance in multiple aspects including reasoning quality, trajectory accuracy, alignment, and more.
• Easy-to-use scripts and notebooks that enable application across a wide range of use cases, from autolabeling new data to fine-tuning with it.

Short review of the Waymo Ojai with some driverless footage.