Investors Are Losing Patience With Driverless Cars' Slow Pace

After years of ambitious targets and bold promises, investors are growing impatient with the pace of driverless-car development, applying pressure on an industry that had become accustomed to latitude and piles of cash from investors. Auto makers in recent weeks scaled back plans for the technology amid new pressure to curb expenses during an economic slowdown. An influential hedge fund also has questioned Google-parent Alphabet Inc.'s yearslong effort to advance self-driving technology, an endeavor that has proven thornier than many experts predicted just a few years ago. Activist investor TCI Fund Management this month sent a letter to Alphabet questioning the company's continued spending on its self-driving unit, Waymo. "Waymo has not justified its excessive investments, and its losses should be reduced dramatically," Christopher Hohn, TCI managing director, wrote in the letter.