How Apple and Waymo are capitalizing on rivals’ slip-ups
As Facebook and Uber have struggled with crises, their fellow tech companies have disdained their actions, drawing distinctions between themselves and their competitors.
One company’s bad news is another’s golden opportunity.
When Uber’s autonomous vehicle accident threatened the entire self-driving car industry, some of the beleaguered company’s rivals were quick to prove they were different.
Waymo, a Google subsidiary that has been developing autonomous cars since 2009, sent its CEO on a media tour to discuss how Waymo’s technology would have avoided a similar tragedy.
“I want to be really respectful of Elaine, the woman who lost her life, and her family,” said Waymo CEO John Krafcik at a National Automobile Dealers Association meeting in Las Vegas on Saturday in his first public comments on the Arizona death, which has raised questions on whether self-driving technology should be tested on public roads.
“(But) in the case of a pedestrian or a pedestrian with a bicycle, we have a lot of confidence that our technology would be robust and would be able to handle situations like that one,” he said.
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