Google's Waymo self-driving platform shows big improvements

When the California Department of Motor Vehicles released its annual autonomous vehicle disengagement report Wednesday, Google's self-driving platform, Waymo, came away looking like the big moves it made this year were well worth the fuss. The company posted significant year-over-year improvements in its self-driving tech's safety and efficiency, even as it ramps up its autonomous efforts. As its name implies, the DMV report tracks the total number of disengagements that occur while the self-driving cars log test miles on the state's roads. Disengagements are instances when a driver takes manual control of a test vehicle in autonomous mode to correct its trajectory. According to the report, which was first noted by The Verge, Waymo's test cars logged 635,868 miles in 2016 and experienced 124 "reportable disengagements."