May 3rd, 2017 Car News of the Day: Waymo and Uber in court, nuTonomy teaming up with Peugeot

author: Claire   

Waymo said Levandowski got $250 million in Uber stock for Otto

Uber and Waymo are facing off in court today with their ongoing lawsuit over trade secret and patent infringement. Waymo said that the formation of Otto was an intentional plot between founder Anthony Levandowski and Uber to hide the fact that he went to work for the ride-hailing company after leaving Google. 

To prove this, Waymo points to a stock grant with a vesting date of Jan 28th, 2016—the day after Levandowski resigned. It shows that 5 million shares in Uber stock granted to him with an estimated value of more than $250 million. An Uber spokesperson refuted that it is common for vesting deals to back-date to the formation of an acquired startup. The date of the agreement will become a pivotal point in the case. 

Nutonomy teaming up with Groupe PSA for autonomous car testing in Singapore

Boston, MA based self-driving car start-up Nutonomy has sealed a deal with Peugeot-maker Groupe PSA to test autonomous vehicles in Singapore. 

As a company that span out of MIT 2013, Nutonomy is very familiar with Singapore. It has a relationship with local Uber rival Grab, and also the Singapore Economic Development Board, which is an investor in its recent $16 million in fundraising. The cooperation will see Nutonomy's self-driving technology, including software and sensors be integrated into a customized version of Peugeot 3008. The self-driving tests will take place on public roads of Singapore starting in September.

Tesla Opening Its Own Body Repair Shops

Tesla announced today that it is opening its own company-owned repair shops, to address the backlog of body shop repairs. 

"To significantly improve the customer experience with out-of-warranty body repairs, we intend to open the first Tesla-owned body repair shops later this year and expand the existing network of third-party Tesla certified body shops," the company said in a letter sent to investors today on its Q1 2017 earnings.

Moreover, Tesla added that it plans to add more than 100 mobile repair trucks by the next quarter. Currently, Tesla is working with third-party shops for repairing its vehicles because owners often complain that the automaker takes too long to send parts for repairs. As the Model 3 release is approaching, the EV company wants to better address any vehicle service issues.

GM launches Maven Gig that is tailor-made for gig economy car sharing

General Motor's wing company Maven launched its Maven Gig on Wednesday, giving city workers an easy way to access to a car for short-distance needs, such as deliver groceries and food, or ride-sharing services.The program is for people who wants more flexibility and range, and cities that have driver earning potential (frequent use of on-demand delivery and reshaping services). 

The service can be rented for $229 per week, including insurance, unlimited miles, free charging, and regular maintenance. The car provided will be Chevrolet Bolt EVs initially. 

Maven Gig is launching in San Diego, and will be rolling out to San Francisco and Los Angeles afterwards.

Envoy to bring car-sharing to real estate business 

Los Angeles car startup Envoy has launched its first pilot of two cars in an LA apartment complex, to try to connect the car-sharing service with real estate developers.

They ask for 5-10% cut of real estate developers' gross revenue on subscriptions to their car-sharing service, and then Envoy will offer its vehicles as a perk to residents of luxury condos in the Marina Del Rey area of Los Angeles.

The company has raised $500,000 so far, and is looking to raise additional funds to deploy 100 more vehicles at luxury properties across the country. 

Claire

Claire Peng has over 6 years of professional experience in the media industry, covering TV, newspaper and online media. She was once a reporter and producer for Fairchild Television based in Toronto Canada, and worked as an English news reporter for the Global Times in Beijing. She writes mainly about self-driving, companies investment, and the enterprise lab.