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Uber will offer self-driving Volvos in Pittsburgh this month
Uber customers in Pittsburgh who request a ride from the ride sharing service may find themselves riding in a specially prepared Volvo XC90 that can drive itself. Passengers will ride in a self-driving vehicle chaperoned by a human driver behind the wheel ready to take control of the car if necessary and an engineer monitoring the operation of the autonomous system. This will mark the first time a self-driving car has been used in commercial service in the United States.
Uber’s self-driving car program has been under the stewardship of John Bares since January, 2015. Bares was head of Carnegie Mellon University’s National Robotics Engineering Center for 13 years before he left to start Carnegie Robotics, a Pittsburgh-based company that makes components for self-driving industrial robots used in mining, farming, and the military.
“I turned him [Kalanick] down three times. But the case was pretty compelling.” Bares says. Once he joined Uber, he quickly put together a team consisting of hundreds of engineers, robotics experts, and few old fashioned auto mechanics. The mission was nothing less that to replace Uber’s 1 million human drivers with robotic drivers as soon as possible. The message is, if you drive for Uber, you should keep your resumé up to date and your eyes open for other lines of work.
Pittsburgh is the center of the Uber self-driving experiment because that is where the talent is. Carnegie Mellon is a world leader in autonomous systems. Its graduates are working on the Google car and are in high demand at any company planning to offer self-driving cars, including Apple and Tesla. Earlier in the year, a Tesla Model S loaded with cameras and sensors, presumably a test mule for Autopilot 2.0, was spotted testing in Pittsburgh.
So far, Uber has just a few specially modified Volvo XC90s ready for commercial service, but it expects to have 100 of them by the end of the year. The hardware at the heart of its self-driving system includes cameras, radar, lidar, GPS receivers, and a liquid cooled computer mounted in the rear.
Uber self-driving Volvo XC90
Uber is moving fast. “We are going commercial,” says CEO Travis Kalanick. “This can’t just be about science.” Last month, it purchased Otto, a start-up company that is working to bring self-driving long haul trucks to market. In theory, its technology will allow truck drivers to crawl in back and nap while the trucks are on the highway. Uber will take over and re-brand that business and incorporate the Otto technology into its own self-driving systems.
Otto’s founders were all previously members of the Google car program, but grew impatient with the slow, plodding pace of development at Google. They wanted an opportunity to showcase their talents much sooner than they could if they remained at Google. “We were really excited about building something that could be launched early,” says Anthony Levandowski, co-founder of Otto.
Kalanick is clearly looking to be the first to begin offering a self-driving ride hailing service. He intends to beat Tesla, Apple, Google, Ford, and Genera Motors to the punch. “Nobody has set up software that can reliably drive a car safely without a human,” he says in an oblique reference to Tesla’s Autopilot system. “We are focusing on that.” Developing an autonomous vehicle, he adds, “is basically existential for us.”
At first, trips in the self-driving Volvos will be free. Uber’s standard local rate is $1.30 per mile but Kalanick says eventually prices will be so low that the cost per mile will be cheaper in a self-driving Uber than in a private car, even in rural areas. “That could be seen as a threat,” says Volvo CEO Hakan Samuelsson. “We see it as an opportunity.”
Source: Bloomberg Photo credit: Uber, AP
Tesla confirmed this morning that it has sent the first production units, manufactured with no steering wheel or pedals, to on-road testing in Austin, sharing video of the first rides with no human controls.
The lack of steering wheels and pedals in the Cybercab aligns with Tesla’s self-certification of Robotaxi as Level 4 SAE, a platform it plans to make widespread through internal vehicles and customer-owned cars that will operate and generate revenue for individuals.
The start of these engineering tests is a major signal for Tesla, which plans to bring driverless, wheel-less, and pedal-less Cybercabs to market in the coming months. With production already well underway at Gigafactory Texas, where the Cybercab is built, there is some inclination to believe the first public rides could happen sooner rather than later.
Engineering tests of the first production Cybercab have begun in Austin pic.twitter.com/fk3KQvcE8a
— Tesla (@Tesla) June 30, 2026
Tesla’s engineering tests will put the Cybercab in real-world scenarios, testing not only the hardware, but more importantly, the software that drives the car around Austin with nobody supervising it within the car.
This is perhaps the biggest part of the internal testing process, especially prior to allowing regular, everyday people to hail the Cybercab for an autonomous ride. These early rides serve as a true benchmark for Tesla: How many rides can it achieve safely? How many miles did it travel consecutively without needing an intervention? What scenarios challenge the Full Self-Driving suite the most?
The proper precautions have already been put into place as well, as Tesla released the First Responders Guide to Cybercab over the weekend, ensuring that emergency services have 24/7 access to Robotaxi Assistance, as well as other boundaries, such as Geofencing features that can be used to redirect autonomous vehicle traffic due to accidents, road closures, construction, or maintenance.
Cybercab seems genuinely close to being added to the Robotaxi fleet in Austin, but Tesla has prioritized safety throughout this entire process. Therefore, we think it could be months before it truly starts giving rides to the public. People have been frustrated with this, but Robotaxi in Austin has a tremendous safety record so far, so the slow rollout has kept people safe and accidents to a minimum.
The most important thing is that Tesla continues to show consistent progress in the Cybercab’s ramp-up toward fleet addition. A few weeks back, we saw the EPA reward the Cybercab a Certificate of Conformity, allowing it to enter the stream of commerce. Then, we saw Tesla add decals, signaling that it was likely about to start testing it publicly. That has now happened.
The next big move will be the announcement of the first rides, so this Summer should be filled with anticipation.
For years, there have been images and videos across social media platforms that have reminded me of when I was a 15-year-old kid teased by “Xbox 720” videos on YouTube. These videos are of the supposed “Tesla Phone” that Elon Musk was secretly developing in between leading Tesla with its electric cars and SpaceX with its reusable rockets.
Would you buy a Tesla phone ? pic.twitter.com/aaTwvvIJit
— Tesla Owners Silicon Valley (@teslaownersSV) October 6, 2023
Although Musk has put those rumors to bed several times, it was never completely out of the realm that he could get involved in cell phones in some capacity. Think outside the box and more macro-level, though. Instead of reinventing the computer, Musk reinvented connectivity by developing Starlink with SpaceX.
It could be something similar, TD Cowen analyst Gregory Williams said in a note last week, where he hinted SpaceX could be gathering some steam to acquire T-Mobile.
Williams said it would be the “clear choice” for SpaceX if it decided to go through with a network acquisition. He also suggested AT&T.
The move would be possible through selling more of its own stock, which would help SpaceX raise the money to purchase T-Mobile, which would cost roughly $300 billion. It could be one of the moves SpaceX makes post-IPO in terms of an acquisition: it already acquired Cursor AI for $60 billion.
Other analysts, like Dan Ives of Wedbush, believe SpaceX and Tesla will eventually merge into one anyway, and that conglomeration could come as soon as this year, some have said.
The implications of SpaceX purchasing T-Mobile are massive. A combined entity would create a truly ubiquitous network: T-Mobile’s terrestrial 5G towers and Starlink’s growing constellation of Direct-to-Cell satellites. This would essentially eliminate dead zones across the U.S. and potentially globally.
SpaceX would instantly become a full-scale facilities-based carrier with satellite differentiation; a huge advantage. This would pressure AT&T and Verizon heavily.
There are also concerns like a potential reduction in long-term competition, and of course, a deal of that size would face intense scrutiny from government agencies.
The strategic fit is compelling due to the existing Starlink–T-Mobile partnership and complementary technologies (space + terrestrial). It could create a dominant integrated communications player. However, the regulatory, financial, and execution hurdles are enormous — this remains highly speculative with no indication SpaceX is actively pursuing it right now.
Tesla revealed a major new Cybercab detail in a guide it released for First Responders, showing new territory in its beliefs and intentions for the ride-hailing-focused vehicle that entered production in April.
The First Responders Guide is released to give fire departments, paramedics, and other emergency personnel the proper guidance on what to do in the event of an accident, entrapment, or other situation that would require immediate attention.
On one of the pages of the First Responders Guide, Tesla revealed a stark detail about the Cybercab, which could help personnel enter the vehicle more easily in case of an emergency.
Tesla Cybercab has one important piece that AI4 cars might need for FSD
It shows Tesla has no intention of releasing any Cybercab units that were initially proposed for ride-hailing services for the general public with any manual controls, meaning a steering wheel or pedals:
“A Cybercab equipped with steering wheel, brake pedal, and an acceleration pedal is typically an engineering or test vehicle, and operates at SAE Level 2 autonomy. Cybercab is not typically equipped with a steering wheel or acceleration and brake pedals.”
New official Cybercab documentation from Tesla:
“A Cybercab equipped with steering wheel, brake pedal, and an acceleration pedal is typically an engineering or test vehicle, and operates at SAE Level 2 autonomy. Cybercab is not typically equipped with a steering wheel or… https://t.co/P6ut1mZyzr pic.twitter.com/yq6skl9s2J
— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) June 27, 2026
This is a major development for those who continue to believe Tesla planned to release the Cybercab with any sort of manual controls so that passengers could take over if needed. However, when Tesla started manufacturing production versions of the Cybercab in Giga Texas earlier this year, they were spotted without a steering wheel or pedals.
It essentially confirms the company has no intentions of bringing manual controls to the car’s production versions. Some have argued that the likelihood of Tesla having something
There still are some Cybercab units out there with a steering wheel and pedals, and as Tesla said, these cars are engineering or test vehicles, which have Safety Monitors on board to help the car out of a precarious situation or emergency.
Tesla sends production Cybercab with no steering wheel, pedals to on-road testing
Tesla Phone? Not quite, but close: analyst
