Uber promises its new system is smarter and would identify a jaywalking pedestrian. A year and a half since the crash in Tempe, Arizona, that left a pedestrian, Elaine Herzberg, dead and Uber in the spotlight over its self-driving car program, we're still learning more about why the wreck occurred and how investigators plan to shore up autonomous vehicle safety. The latest comes from Bloomberg, which reported Tuesday on hundreds of new documents released by the National Transportation Safety Board. The safety body found Uber's self-driving car prototype did not feature any sort of system to identify pedestrians outside of a crosswalk. Translation: There's no way the Uber autonomous car could see jaywalkers.

Of all the luxury car brands, Audi has been the most aggressive in terms of putting semi-autonomous technology into its production cars. Now the German automaker is offering a sneak peek of its effort to build fully driverless cars, as well as one of the partners it says will be instrumental in putting self-driving cars on the road by 2021. Audi, which is owned by the Volkswagen Group, recently pledged to spend almost $16 billion (14 billion euros) on electric mobility and self-driving technology through 2023. Much of that work will take place at Autonomous Intelligent Driving (AID), a wholly owned subsidiary of Audi. The group was founded a year-and-a-half ago, and today around 150 employees.

The Apple Car could be in the works after all. Longtime Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo of TF Securities has predicted that the iPhone maker could release its an Apple-branded car between 2023 and 2025. Insiders and Apple fans have predicted that the company will release a car at some point in the near future, but so far, the only firm details that have emerged surround its self-driving car program. Kuo, who has correctly predicted several Apple products in the past, believes an Apple Car could be the firm's next'star product.' It has the potential to revolutionize the auto industry, just like the iPhone did for the smartphone industry when it was first released in 2007, Kuo noted.

The race to create self-driving trucks just got a little less crowded. That's because Uber announced Monday that the ride-hailing giant is shuttering its self-driving truck program, a division that made history in 2016 by completing the world's first autonomous truck delivery -- 50,000 cans of Budweiser. That division -- a part of Uber's Advanced Technologies Group -- had other successes as well, including delivering freight on highways in Arizona using automated Volvo big rigs. The robot-driven Volvo trucks were rolled out in November and included a human backup driver, the company said. The company did not have a formal partnership with Volvo but, instead, retrofitted Volvo trucks with its technology.

Uber has its eyes set on going public in 2019. CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said the ride-hailing startup is'on track' for an initial public offering in the second half of next year, saying Uber has a'very strong balance sheet' that could position it to do so. Khosrowshahi also shed some new light into Uber's self-driving car program, which has been paused in the wake of a fatal crash involving one of the firm's autonomous vehicles. Uber has its eyes set on an IPO in the second half of 2019, with CEO Dara Khosrowshahi saying the firm's in a'good position' in terms of profitability and margins to go public'We're in a good position in terms of the company's profile, in terms of profitability and margins continue to get better,' Khosrowshahi told CNBC at Recode's Code Conference in California. Khosrowshahi said he envisions Uber becoming the'Amazon for transportation,' serving as a platform for multiple transportation modes, like buses and bikes.

The race to perfect robot cars continues despite fears kindled by the death of a woman hit by a self-driving Uber vehicle while pushing a bicycle across an Arizona street. Uber put a temporary halt to its self-driving car program in the US after the fatal accident this month near Phoenix, where several other companies including Google-owned Waymo are testing such technology. While the Uber accident may be used to advance arguments of those fearful of driverless cars, it does not change the fact that'transformative technology is coming whether we like it or not,' according to Adie Tomer, a fellow at the Brookings Institution think tank in Washington. Pilot models of the Uber self-driving car, pictured in 2016 before one of the autonomous vehicles killed a woman in Arizona. 'There certainly will be calls to stop all autonomous vehicle testing, not just Uber's program,' Tomer said in a post on the institution's website.

Apple seems to speeding ahead with its self-driving car program. The iPhone maker has nearly doubled its fleet of autonomous test vehicles in California over the last few months, according to the Financial Times. In January, Apple was operating 27 self-driving cars on the roads, but that number has since grown to 45 vehicles, data from California's Department of Motor Vehicles shows. The new report comes as some firms have suspended their autonomous driving tests following a fatal accident involving an Uber self-driving car this weekend. If Apple's fleet has increased this much, it has surged ahead of its rivals in terms of the size of its test fleet.

Two tech giants racing for a lead in autonomous driving clashed Monday in court as former Google car unit Waymo's lawyer argued that Uber's boss deliberately chose'to cheat' to get a leg up on competitors. The accusations flew in the opening day of a trial in which Google parent Alphabet's Waymo division is seeking at least $1 billion over the theft of trade secrets from its self-driving car program. In opening remarks before the jury in San Francisco federal court, Waymo lawyer Charles Verhoeven maintained that Uber's founder and former chief executive Travis Kalanick made the decision to use stolen trade secrets to enable the global ridesharing giant to move into autonomous driving. Google parent Alphabet's Waymo division is seeking at least $1 billion over the theft of trade secrets from its self-driving car program. 'He made a decision and the decision was to cheat,' Verhoeven said.

See how self-driving cars prepare for the real world inside a private testing facility owned by Google's autonomous car company, Waymo. Waymo CEO John Krafcik arrives at the Phillip Burton Federal Building and United States Courthouse for the start of the Waymo vs. Uber trial in San Francisco, California on February 05, 2018. SAN FRANCISCO -- A Silicon Valley courtroom drama that could determine a leader in the self-driving car race kicked off Monday, with lawyers for Uber and Alphabet-owned Waymo making their cases to rapt jurors and around 70 reporters. Armed with redacted executive emails and blunt talk, both sides seemed eager to finally lay out arguments after nearly a year of pre-trial motions before a judge who doesn't mince words -- including Monday's snipe about requests for preferential treatment for some witnesses "just because they're famous." Waymo, the name of what started as Google's self-driving car program, says Uber sensed it couldn't catch up to its program, which launched in 2009.

Uber executives are travelling the globe to reassure regulators that the company is changing the way it does business. As Laura Frykberg reports, it follows a string of controversies that have hurt the ride-hailing firm's reputation. A group led by Japanese technology conglomerate Softbank has acquired a major stake in Uber. In a tender offer that expired Thursday, Dec. 28, SoftBank acquired a 15 percent stake in Uber while the remaining members got about 3 percent, according to a person familiar with the situation who was not authorized to publicly discuss details. (Photo: Eric Risberg, AP) SAN FRANCISCO -- There's a big trial starting Monday between two companies you've heard of -- Uber and Waymo, the autonomous car company owned by Google-parent Alphabet. But their brawl is over a topic you might not be familiar with: the technology inside a little spinning eyeball on the top of a self-driving car's roof.