The creator of the Cruise autonomous vehicle brand, owned by General Motors, has voluntarily exited his post shortly after the self-driving car company halted operations following an incident and the withdrawal of its operating permit in California.
Kyle Vogt, who initiated the venture in 2013 before it was acquired by US automaker General Motors in 2016, did not specify the reason for his departure.
Based in San Francisco, Cruise is regarded as a leading autonomous driving organization globally and had commenced offering paid rides to customers in certain US urban areas. However, it ceased all autonomous vehicle operations on October 26 after Californian authorities rescinded its license to transport passengers without a human driver post an incident on October 2.
Subsequent to the incident, the company initiated a recall of nearly 1,000 vehicles to implement software updates.
Upon Vogt’s departure, Mary Barra, CEO of General Motors, appointed Mo Elshenawy, the Executive Vice President of Engineering at Cruise, as the Chief Technology Officer, as per an internal communication cited by TechCrunch.
Barra reportedly expressed gratitude for Vogt’s decade-long contribution and acknowledged his decision to resign, underscoring the significance of restoring public trust. She stated, “Safety, transparency, and accountability will be our guiding principles as we endeavor to regain that trust.”
38-year-old Vogt, a seasoned entrepreneur who previously created the video streaming service Twitch, acquired by Amazon for nearly $1 billion, and Socialcam, a video application. Following his resignation, the co-founder of Twitch, Emmett Shear, was appointed as the temporary CEO of artificial intelligence startup OpenAI after the expulsion of its CEO, Sam Altman.
Vogt mentioned plans to dedicate time to his family and explore new concepts in a series of posts on X (formerly Twitter), expressing gratitude for the journey with Cruise and articulating optimism about its future prospects.
He affirmed, “The current state of our roads is unsatisfactory, but together we have showcased the potential for a significantly improved future.”
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Today I resigned from my position as CEO of Cruise. (1/5)
— Kyle Vogt (@kvogt) November 20, 2023
The incident on October 2 underscored the ongoing development required in driverless technology before a broader implementation. A pedestrian was struck by another vehicle into the path of a Cruise car, which came to a halt briefly before continuing for an additional 6 meters (20ft), causing severe injuries to the pedestrian.
This incident and the subsequent permit revocation posed a significant setback for Cruise and the autonomous driving sector, which is striving to create software capable of navigating urban environments while assuring regulators and the public of its improved safety over human drivers.
