Washington (AFP)

Look for neither the steering wheel nor the pedals, this autonomous shuttle, the latest born at Cruise, the General Motors startup, does not have one.

This vehicle is "our answer to the question of which transportation system would you want to build if you could start from scratch," said Dan Ammann, the CEO of the startup, unveiling the Cruise Origin electric vehicle Tuesday evening.

"We removed the engine. We removed the driver, who is most often tired, distracted, pissed off and in a hurry. We removed the equipment that was there to assist the driver, including the steering wheel, pedals, mirrors, windshield wipers and narrow seats, "he continued.

The startup explained that the Origin is intended to be a production vehicle, designed for shared transport.

This announcement was made without "any details on its scope, launch date or even its cost (have been) given, which leaves observers more questions than answers," noted analyst Richard Windsor, on the Radio Free Mobile blog.

According to him, no major development in autonomous vehicles will take place before 2028.

He "suspects GM Cruise is under pressure to show something and, while the technology is far from commercialized, an exhibition car is all they have to show us."

"Therefore, I don't think it advances GM Cruise's schedule on the market and I don't see any reason to revise my estimate to make autonomous driving a commercial reality," he added.

GM bought the Californian start-up Cruise in 2016 during the race for an autonomous car between the car manufacturers. Driverless, it is supposed to make it possible to reshape urban spaces for these shared vehicles.

But to date, autonomous vehicles have not passed the stage of circulation in tight spaces, most often for test periods. In most of them, a driver can regain control in an emergency.

Alphabet, Google’s parent company, is among the most advanced with Waymo.

© 2020 AFP