Cruise Chief Technology Officer Kyle Vogt (left) with Voyage CEO Oliver Cameron, who will join Cruise as part of an acquisition of the company.
Travel
The majority-owned automotive company Cruise has agreed to acquire Voyage, a self-employed automotive company operating in retirement communities.
The companies, which did not disclose the terms of the deal, announced this in a blog post on Monday by Voyage CEO Oliver Cameron, who will join Cruise as vice president of the product. Cruise spokesman Ray Wert declined to comment on the cost of the deal.
It is unclear how long Cruise will last in the retirement communities. Wert said the “communities in which they work are not on our immediate roadmap.” Instead, Cruise is set to start a robot taxi business in San Francisco. A majority of Voyage’s 60 employees are expected to join Cruise, Wert said.
“Voyage is closely aligned with our mission and shares our way of thinking about safety, accessibility, cost and convenience for customers,” Wert said in an email. “Their talented team is very productive and inventive, and has direct experience in developing a complete solution for AV solutions that will help accelerate our efforts to build the world’s most advanced self-driving vehicles.”
The acquisition contributes to an ongoing consolidation in the autonomous vehicle sector after years of enthusiasm to identify the technology as the next multimillion-dollar market for transportation companies. Some companies, such as Uber Technologies, have given up on developing the systems internally, while others like Zoox have been sold to Amazon. Alphabet’s Waymo remains the most notable forerunner and manages a public autonomous vehicle fleet in Arizona.
Cruise has remained steadfast during testing since GM was acquired in 2016. It has expanded its registered test fleet to more than 200 vehicles, but has not yet announced when it plans to offer a robotic taxi fleet to the public in San Francisco. It was initially planned to do so in 2019.
Other investors in Cruise now include Honda Motor, SoftBank Vision Fund, Microsoft and others.
The Cruise Voyage Agreement remains subject to normal closing conditions.