Waymo will end Uber exclusivity in Austin and Atlanta in January 2028 and use its own app
Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana told Bloomberg the company will start offering rides through its own app in Austin and Atlanta from January 2028, months before its Uber deal was due to expire. Waymo is choosing the rider relationship over the extra trips Uber says it delivers.
Waymo will end its exclusive arrangement with Uber in Austin and Atlanta starting in January 2028 and offer rides there through its own app, as it does in its other cities, co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana told Bloomberg News on Nov. 4, TechCrunch reported. The deal had been due to expire in May 2028.
Waymo is trading away Uber's best argument. The same day, Uber told investors that its US AV partners average about 30% more trips per vehicle per day than first-party deployments nationwide, the edge it says pays for its marketplace fee (Uber's AV plan). Mawakana's case is the rider. On Uber, riders never know whether they will get a robotaxi or a human driver, which she called "a little bit of a crapshoot." "It's important for us to have that relationship with the rider," she said. Uber told Bloomberg it was Waymo's idea not to add an option to book a robotaxi directly in Uber's app.
Uber told TechCrunch it still plans to host Waymo robotaxis on its app for as long as the two companies agree.
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