The bad news for autonomous vehicle companies continues as Aptiv will reduce its stake in Motional, its automated driving joint venture with Hyundai Motor Co.
The news comes after just a few days after General Motors said it would cut spending on its autonomous driving unit Cruise Automation after losing $1.9 billion in just 2023.
Aptiv echoed GM’s reasons for the cut as it has incurred millions in losses related to the investment.
"While our Motional joint venture continues to make progress on their technology road map, we've decided to no longer allocate capital to it," said Kevin Clark, CEO of Aptiv, during its earnings call this week.
Why it matters
While autonomous driving promises to be a safer alternative to human driving, there is clearly still much work to do before these vehicles become a larger part of the automotive world.
The problems with Cruise Automation, Tesla’s issues with its automated driving software, automated vendors closing shop and consumer issues with safety and traffic jams all add up to a technology that needs quite a bit of fine-tuning as well as development before it hits prime time.
Vendors that have ended or cut back on automated driving development include:
- Ford Motors
- General Motors
- Volkswagen
- Aptiv
Autonomous vehicles are bound to continue development. But the market may be entering a period where testing slows substantially given many of these vendors are no longer comfortable bleeding money.
However, as with the Argo shuttering three years ago and now Motional’s issues, collaborations may no longer be enough motivation for companies to foot the financial burden.
In all, it is a tumultuous time for autonomous vehicles and automated driving companies headed into 2024.
