Local Company Driving to the Future

Foster City is home to two large companies, Visa and Gilead Sciences, but its most exciting business, potentially, is the "secretive" startup Zoox.

Founded by two relative unknowns, Zoox isn’t backed by a major auto company like General Motors’ Cruise, or by a major tech company like Waymo, Baidu, Apple, Uber or Lyft.

But it has raised $800 million, has a private-market valuation of $3.2 billion, has attracted almost 600 employees and says it’s on track to offer a robot taxi service in 2020 in San Francisco.

Zoox' car does seem different from other self-driving vehicles on the drawing board:

The front and back will be symmetrical, and the car will be able to drive in either direction with ease. Each wheel will have its own motor, with sensors and cameras integrated. The four passengers will experience “social seating” in which they face one another as if around a dining table. A battery will power the all-electric vehicle all day.

Custom lights and sounds will communicate with pedestrians and other cars, such as notifying someone who is in the way. “It will be inclusive and multicultural so as not to shout English words at them,” [CEO Jesse] Levinson said.

A more in-depth article from Bloomberg is here.

Zoox will work on the esthetics later (Bloomberg photo)