GM ends support for Cruise robotaxis

General Motors said Tuesday it will no longer fund the development of a commercial robotaxi business and will instead absorb its self-driving car subsidiary Cruise and combine it with the automaker’s own efforts to develop driver assistance features - and eventually fully autonomous personal vehicles.

The pivot is a remarkable step for the automaker, which acquired the self-driving startup Cruise in March 2016 for $1 billion. Since then, GM has poured billions into the company in a bid to commercialize autonomous vehicle technology via a robotaxi business.

GM said in a statement that "the considerable time and resources that would be needed to scale the business, along with an increasingly competitive robotaxi market" were the reasons for the change. GM said it expects the restructuring to lower spending by more than $1 billion annually after the proposed plan is completed, which is expected in the first half of 2025.

GM owns about 90% of Cruise. The company said it has agreements with other minority shareholders to buy back shares and raise its ownership to more than 97%. GM previously brought on a number of external investors including Microsoft, Walmart, Softbank, T.Rowe Price and Honda as the company sought to raise the billions in capital needed to bring robotaxis to the public. In 2022, GM expanded its stake in Cruise and acquired SoftBank Vision Fund 1's equity ownership ifor $2.1 billion. At the time, GM also made an additional $1.35 billion investment in Cruise, replacing a previous commitment made by the fund in 2018.

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