GM brings in new CEO to steer troubled Cruise robotaxi service while Waymo ramps up in San Francisco

General Motors on Tuesday named a veteran technology executive with roots in the video game industry to steer its troubled robotaxi service Cruise as it tries to recover from a gruesome collision that triggered the suspension of its California license.

Marc Whitten, one of the key engineers behind the Xbox video game console, will take over as Cruise’s chief executive nearly nine months after one of the service’s robotaxis dragged a jaywalking pedestrian — who had just been struck by a vehicle driven by a human — across a darkened street in San Francisco before coming to a stop.

That early October 2023 incident prompted California regulators to slam the brakes on Cruise’s robotaxis in San Francisco. It had previously giving the driverless vehicles approval to charge for rides throughout the second densest city in the U.S., despite objections of local government officials who cited flaws in the autonomous technology.

General Motors, which had hoped Cruise would be generating $1 billion in annual revenue by 2025, has since scaled back its massive investments in the robotaxi service. The cutbacks resulted in 900 workers being laid off j ust weeks after Cruise co-founder and former CEO Kyle Vogt resigned from his job in the aftermath of crash that sent the pedestrian to the hospital.

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