Gearing Up for a Self-Driving Future, Ford Drops $1 Billion on an AI Startup

If you're following the race to build self-driving cars, and trying to track the various partnerships and pilot programs and hang-outs between tech companies and mapmakers and automakers themselves, sorry about that headache. Today, Ford announced it's investing $1 billion over the next five years in Argo AI, a months-old startup run by Carnegie Mellon roboticists and engineers who really know their artificial intelligence stuff. With this move, Ford tacitly acknowledges it lacks the know-how to deliver on its promise to put a fleet of self-driving cars on the road by 2021--and that it's not above bringing in a ringer. "With Argo AI's agility and Ford's scale, we're combining the benefits of a technology startup with the experience and discipline we have at Ford," says Ford CEO Mark Fields. In other words: You're great at algorithms, we're great at cars--let's hang out.