| Vol. 11 |
| Self-driving startup Argo AI hits $7.5 billion valuation Tech Crunch, July 30th Autonomous vehicle technology startup Argo AI is valued at $7.5 billion, just a little more than three years after the company burst on the scene with a $1 billion investment from Ford. |
| Uber, Lyft drivers win N.Y. unemployment insurance payments Bloomberg, July 28th Uber Technologies Inc. and Lyft Inc. drivers won the right to immediately receive unemployment insurance benefits after a federal judge ruled New York Department of Labor was taking too long to make payments. |
| Aioi Nissay invests in U.S. flying car startup Nippon, July 22nd Japan’s Aioi Nissay Dowa Insurance Co. has invested in U.S. startup Joby Aviation, which is developing electric vertical takeoff and landing, or eVTOL, aircraft, better known as flying cars. |
| Survey reveals who’s winning the delivery app wars:DoorDash, Uber Eats, or Grubhub Mashable, August 3rd When the coronavirus pandemic hit, many Americans went from eating at restaurants to ordering meals on their phones. A new survey reveals which delivery app they have been using. |
| COVID-19: The future mobility delusion Automotive News, August 3rd Beyond the panic and denial surrounding the initial stages of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, the world’s short-term response naturally emphasized the health aspect of the pandemic, which was then followed by the mid-term realization that one needs to ‘get through’ this in an economically viable manner that can ensure the solvency of the world economy. Only then is the economy able to refocus on the global long-term perspective. |
| Smart Columbus launches three mobility technology pilots Intelligent Transport, August 3rd City of Columbus Mayor Andrew J. Ginther joined community leaders for the unveiling of three Smart Columbus projects that will pilot new mobility technology to serve the needs of the community. Smart Mobility Hubs, Connected Vehicles, and the re-commissioned Linden LEAP seek to improve mobility, road safety, and community food support. The projects are funded by the $40 million grant awarded to Columbus, the winner of the 2016 Smart City Challenge, by the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT). |
| Ride Hail a drone? Uber Elevate moves forward withhidden level collaboration Drone Life, July 23rd How soon will it be before you can ride hail a drone? Uber Elevate is investing heavily in urban air mobility (UAM). This week, Uber Elevate announced a collaboration iwth venture -backed Hidden Level, a company specializing in low altitude airspace monitoring, to advance UAM operations. |
| Lyft partners with rental group Sixt to target carless city dwellers Auto Blog, August 1st Lyft Inc has partnered with the U.S. unit of German rental car group Sixt SE to expand its in-app rental business to carless city dwellers eager to take a trip. Lyft users can book a designated car through the ride-hailing app, add insurance and extras and directly pick up the car from the rental lot without waiting at the counter. |
| MoceanLab and USC Keck School of Medicine Launch Program to Help USC’s Street Medicine Team deliver care to L.A.’s homeless residents Yahoo Finance, August 4th MoceanLab, a new L.A.-based mobility laboratory developed by Hyundai Motor Group, is launching a program to help the USC Keck School of Medicine’s Street Medicine Team care for some of the city’s most vulnerable and hard to reach residents: L.A.’s unsheltered homeless population. |
| California’s air pollution cops are eyeing Uber and Lyft Wired, July 26th A proposal would require 60 percent of ride-hail miles to be in electric vehicles by 2030. And the companies are on board. |
| Virgin Galactic debuts design of future Mach 3 high-speed aircraft,signs deal with Rolls-Royce Tech Crunch, August 3rd Virgin Galactic is making strides toward its goal of creating high-speed commercial aircraft that operates a little closer to Earth than its existing passenger spacecraft. The company revealed the initial design of the commercial passenger airplane it’s creating that’s designed to fly at speeds in excess of Mach 3 — faster than the average cruising speed of around Mach 2 that the original Concorde achieved. |
| Autonomous cars: five reasons they still aren’t on our road The Conversation, July 30th Elon Musk thinks his company Tesla will have fully autonomous cars ready by the end of 2020. “There are no fundamental challenges remaining,” he said recently. “There are many small problems. And then there’s the challenge of solving all those small problems and putting the whole system together.” |
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