Google's self driving car project was formerly led by Sebastian Thrun, former director of the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and co-inventor of Google Street View. Thrun's team at Stanford created the robotic vehicle Stanley which won the 2005 DARPA Grand Challenge and its US$2 million prize from the United States Department of Defense.[6] The team developing the system consisted of 15 engineers working for Google, including Chris Urmson, Mike Montemerlo, and Anthony Levandowski who had worked on the DARPA Grand and Urban Challenges.[7]
In October 2010, an attorney for the California Department of Motor Vehicles raised concerns that "[t]he technology is ahead of the law in many areas", citing state laws that "all presume to have a human being operating the vehicle".[6]
According to a May 2011 article in The New York Times, policy makers and regulators have argued that new laws will be required if driverless vehicles are to become a reality because "the technology is now advancing so quickly that it is in danger of outstripping existing law, some of which dates back to the era of horse-drawn carriages".[8]
Nevada passed a law in June 2011 concerning the operation of autonomous cars in Nevada,[8][9][10] which went into effect on March 1, 2012.[11] A Toyota Prius modified with Google's experimental driverless technology was licensed by the Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) in May 2012. This was the first license issue in the United States for a self-driven car.[11]License plates issued in Nevada for autonomous cars will have a red background and feature an infinity symbol (∞) on the left side because, according to the DMV Director, "...using the infinity symbol was the best way to represent the 'car of the future'".[12] Nevada's regulations require a person behind the wheel and one in the passenger's seat during tests.
In late May 2014, Google revealed a new prototype of its driverless car, which had no steering wheel, gas pedal, or brake pedal, being 100% autonomous.[13][14] and unveiled a fully functioning prototype in December of that year that they planned to test on San Francisco Bay Area roads beginning in 2015.[15]
In 2015, Nathaniel Fairfield, Waymo's Principal Engineer, provided "the world's first fully driverless ride on public roads" to an old friend of his, who is legally blind.[16]Steve Mahan, former CEO of the Santa Clara Valley Blind Center, was the recipient of the first self-driving ride on public roads, in Austin, Texas.[2][17] In 2015, the project completed its first driverless ride on public roads, giving a ride to a sole blind man in Austin, Texas.[2][17]
- It was the first driverless ride that was on a public road and was not accompanied by a test driver or police escort. The car had no steering wheel or floor pedals.[18]
In December 2016, the unit was renamed Waymo, and spun off as its own separate division. Waymo is derived from its mission, "a new way forward in mobility".[1]
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