Lyft Autonomous Tech Sells to Toyota for $550m, to Focus on Accepting Self-Driving Cars on Platform Instead

Lyft debuted the Autonomous Driving technology venture in 2018 supposedly for the ride-hailing service's future of the company, but now, the company abandons it after selling to Toyota's Woven Planet for $550 million. Instead of developing their tech, Lyft would be refocusing its venture to accepting vehicles with self-driving features.

While being a prominent ride-hailing company, Lyft has been focused on creating its self-driving technology to use for its services and debut a driverless world that could take passengers from one place to another. The venture was ideal as the company aims to transition to futuristic technology and preventing the different cases of harassment and dangers with a human driver.

In 2018, Lyft's move to go and develop its autonomous technology is to save money on the different needs and requirements for employing a driver with a self-driving vehicle or vice versa.

Lyft Sells Autonomous Driving Tech to Toyota

What better way to go out than regaining the investments and everything that was spent on the venture if the plans or technology hits a dead end? Sell it to another company that is interested in the technology, and who would also benefit from the venture, as much as Lyft did during its development stages and getting to know the pros and cons to it.

According to Reuters, Lyft's multi-million sellout of $550 million to Toyota Motor Corporation and Woven Planet division is a massive one for the company, as it has given the company an earlier timeline for its business. Currently, Lyft has received $200 million of the amount and would be paid the remainder of $350 million for five years.

Toyota and Lyft have already closed the deal, and the ride-hailing company is already free of their autonomous driving technology, which the Japanese car manufacturer now owns. As of now, this is a massive win for Lyft, as it can advance to other plans of the company, and fast track other projects that it has lined up.

Lyft to Focus on Acquiring Self-Driving Cars Instead

After Lyft saying that it is more expensive to entertain vehicles with self-driving technology already, it is now going down that path and focus on getting service cars that have self-driving cars instead. These would mainly consist of electric vehicles from Tesla and other companies that already offer the first iterations of autonomous vehicles.

According to The Verge, Lyft was more successful than Uber with its self-driving technology as it was more productive in a sense and has not resulted in any accidents while testing the feature out. Moreover, both ride-hailing companies are now out of their autonomous vehicle development and focusing on ride-hailing services with self-driving cars.

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Written by Isaiah Richard