Rendering of the Geely robotaxi with Waymo sensors - WAYMO
Waymo announced today it will integrate its technology into a robotaxi base from Chinese manufacturer Geely. Geely owns Volvo and this vehicle was designed in Sweden, it will be under the Geely Zeekr brand and most likely be manufactured in China.
China has been, for several years now, the leading car manufacturing country in the world but its cars are not seen very often in western countries and particularly not in the USA.
Up to this point, western OEMs have not faced much competition from Chinese makers. Chinese cars are not made to fit US Federal Motor Vehicles Safety Standards and can’t be sold in the USA. Chinese brands have no reputation, or even have a negative reputation compared to top western brands — that’s even true in China though it’s been changing there.
Brand is important. Surveys suggest that the nameplate on a car is the top factor in a consumer’s choice of what car to buy. (They say it’s safety when you ask them, but actual buying choices are based on several other things, including brand, performance, cost, luxury and several others.) Maintaining good reputations for their brands has been essential to keeping market position for all major global brands.
This is why the shift to robotaxi is frightening to car OEMs. Customers don’t care a lot about the brand of the car that picks them up. While you might choose between Uber UBER, Uber Select or Uber Black to set the level of car, you don’t care whether your Uber Select is a Lexus PLXS or a Mercedes.
You don’t care much at all what your Uber is. So while people might not be ready to buy a Geely or SAIC car in the USA, they won’t care about this when taking a ride. The brand they might care about is Waymo, and that brand will be on this vehicle. Forbes - link - Brad Templeton - link - more like this (China) - link - more like this - link
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