On Monday, the Financial Times had an article noting that driverless cars may create more traffic jams because more people will take cars if they don’t have to drive themselves. But, the article also noted that “[p]redictions for driverless cars hitting the road en masse have repeatedly been proved wrong.” The FT published my letter giving my theory why in Friday’s paper. Here it is (there is no link because it is behind their paywall):
“Lex talks about how driverless cars may result in more cars on the road as people find car travel even easier if they don’t have to drive themselves. (‘Driverless cars: jam tomorrow’, March 7) But the article also notes that, ‘[a]fter a decade of hype and hundreds of millions of dollars of investment, you still can’t buy a self-driving car.’ As the article concludes, ‘[t]he future [of driverless cars] may also be further away that investors hope.’
What the article does not mention is one of the main reasons self-driving cars face an uncertain future, at least in the United States, and that is lawsuits.
Currently, in a car accident in the US, the driver of one car sues the driver of the other car. It is only very seldom the car manufacturer is sued. For self-driving cars, however, things will be different. There aren’t other drivers to sue. There is just the car – and the companies that made it. It won’t take long for plaintiffs’ lawyers to start filing big lawsuits, even class actions, against the car and technology companies that made the cars and designed the self-driving technology. And, as we have seen in other such situations, there will soon be billion-dollar judgments against the manufacturers and designers.
With risks like that, how many companies are going to bet their company, or even a substantial part of it, on a product that may make them a lot of money – but could also destroy the company in the process?
In the end, designing self-driving cars that are safe to drive may be easier than making self-driving cars that are safe to sell.”
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