Uber and Lucid right this moment introduced a deal to place 20,000 self-driving Gravity SUVs on the highway over the subsequent six years, beginning in 2026.
The Lucid Gravity is a 7-seat, luxurious EV that debuted in November 2024. It begins at $94,900, and a $79,900 model arrives later this 12 months. It is earned a status as one of the luxurious, high-tech electrical vehicles out there. Uber says the brand new rideshare providing will probably be “premium.”
The Lucid Gravity boasts a big ‘frunk’ (Credit score: Emily Forlini)
Lucid Gravity on show on the NY Auto Present (Credit score: Emily Forlini)
It is a world program, however will launch subsequent 12 months in to-be-determined “a significant US metropolis,” Uber says. The same partnership with Volkswagen begins in 2026 as nicely, beginning in Los Angeles.
Though Lucid EVs have a few of their very own autonomous know-how, together with a brand new hands-free driving possibility, the software program for the Uber partnership comes from Nuro. The Nuro Driver is a Degree 4 system, which is far increased than the Degree 2 techniques shoppers can function from Tesla, Ford, GM, and others right this moment.
“Nuro has spent practically a decade constructing an AI-first autonomy system that’s secure, scalable, and vehicle-agnostic, confirmed by way of 5 years of driverless deployments throughout a number of US cities and state,” says Jiajun Zhu, Co-Founder and CEO at Nuro. “By combining our self-driving know-how with Lucid’s superior automobile structure and Uber’s world platform, we’re proud to allow a robotaxi service designed to succeed in thousands and thousands of individuals all over the world.”
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Lucid Gravity sprint (Credit score: Emily Forlini)
Uber selected Lucid due to its superior software program, sources inform us. The EV platform may be simply built-in with Nuro’s know-how. Lucid additionally manufactured the automobile for self-driving from the beginning, together with the required braking and steering controls required for a driverless system.
Uber has been aggressively increasing its self-driving choices amid Waymo’s nationwide enlargement, and Tesla simply getting began with its robotaxi service. It is pursuing a variety of service varieties. It plans to supply its personal fleets, just like the Lucid partnership, in addition to make Waymo automobiles out there on its app, like in Atlanta. The corporate’s purpose is to reinvent automotive possession, an government instructed us at a launch occasion in Might. It is imaginative and prescient is to function a hybrid service sooner or later, made up of vehicles with and with out drivers.
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About Emily Forlini
Senior Reporter
I am the knowledgeable at PCMag for all issues electrical automobiles and AI. I’ve written a whole lot of articles on these subjects, together with product critiques, each day information, CEO interviews, and deeply reported options. I additionally cowl different subjects inside the tech trade, protecting a pulse on what applied sciences are coming down the pipe that might form how we dwell and work.
Learn Emily’s full bio