Amazon's Zoox robotaxi service offers free driverless rides to Las Vegas Strip locations including Resorts World, AREA15 and Topgolf as part of its public launch.

Two new self-driving car services--one in Atlanta from Lyft and May Mobility, another in Las Vegas from Amazon subsidiary Zoox--prove that the robotaxi race is still on. Now comes the hard part. Today, two robotaxi firms operating on opposite sides of the US say they're opening their services to the public. The Ann Arbor tech developer May Mobility has launched its self-driving car service on the Lyft app in a section of Atlanta, Georgia. Starting today, anyone who orders a Lyft in the area might be paired with an autonomous vehicle.

Whether due to consumer backlash or an aging EV lineup, or both, Tesla sales have again seen a global plunge, this time 13 percent last quarter compared to the previous year--proof that the electric automaker hasn't yet turned around a dismal year that saw public opinion of controversial CEO Elon Musk plummet. It could mean Tesla faces a second straight year of falling sales. And yet: Tesla is still the world's most valuable automaker by market capitalization, worth some 990 billion. At least some of that market confidence is likely traced to the happenings of June 22, when Tesla finally began allowing paying passengers to ride its autonomous vehicle service in Austin, Texas. The service rollout has been fairly smooth.

Visitors to CES this week had the opportunity to take a good look at an unusual local: a boxy little autonomous robotaxi designed and operated by Amazon subsidiary Zoox. Zoox has been testing on the Strip since November, though it began driving its purpose-built vehicle on Vegas public roads around its local headquarters back in summer 2023. This year, Zoox aims to begin offering service to the public, first though a "Zoox Explorer" program that allows outside riders to try the service for free. Unlike Waymo's robotaxis, which today are computerized Jaguar EVs, Zoox's AV doesn't have a steering wheel, driver's seat, or pedals. Its seats face inward, and the vehicle is designed to drive in either direction, fore or aft.

Is it a pill on wheels? No, it's Zoox's funny-looking robotaxi, the latest fully autonomous vehicle to hit the streets of California. Zoox's self-driving vehicles began rolling out in San Francisco's SoMa neighborhood this week, and are expected to compete with robotaxis designed by Waymo, which started offering rides to the public in San Francisco and Los Angeles earlier this year. For now, Zoox's driverless trips around SoMa will be for testing and research purposes only. "Since 2017, our test fleet has autonomously navigated San Francisco streets with a safety driver," Zoox CEO Aicha Evans said in a statement.

On Thursday, Tesla CEO and noted fancy leaper Elon Musk will take the stage to showcase the company's robotaxi plans, a la the "Cybercab." Although the vehicle we see isn't expected to be a fully functional product, investors and Tesla fans are hoping for a working prototype or other signs the company can navigate the technological and regulatory obstacles it will face. You can watch the event on an X livestream at 10PM ET. With the Cybercab, Musk is aiming for a fully autonomous vehicle that runs on a Tesla ridesharing network. Owners will also reportedly be able to make their cars available on the network to run as autonomous cabs, likened to a "combination of Airbnb and Uber."

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On the busy streets of suburban Berlin, just south of Tempelhofer Feld, a white Kia is skillfully navigating double-parked cars, roadworks, cyclists, and pedestrians. The company kits its cars out with radar, GPS, ultrasound, and an array of other sensors to allow drivers like Dan to control the vehicles remotely from a purpose-built station equipped with a driver's seat, steering wheel, pedals, and three monitors providing visibility in front of the car and to its side. Vay's approach, which it calls teledriving, is pitched as an alternative to fully autonomous driving, which is proving much harder to achieve than first thought--as the likes of Waymo, Cruise, and Tesla are discovering. At Zoox, remote driving was used as a failsafe for driverless cars. If a self-driving car came across an unexpected obstacle, teleguidance would allow a human operator to take control of the vehicle remotely and steer it around the obstruction. But von der Ohe was frustrated by the industry's slow progress.

The Product Security Threat Analysis and Security Standards team is responsible for the structured security analysis of Zoox products and the judicious application of security standards to the System Development Life Cycle at Zoox. The ideal candidates will have a strong general systems engineering background and demonstrated passion and concrete expertise in cybersecurity. A demonstrated skill in turning the analysis into high-quality written deliverables (such as TARA). Carry out security analysis, threat modeling, and risk assessment for a complex product ecosystem consisting of a custom-designed and built vehicle fleet as well as a portfolio of cloud services. Produce high-quality, readable, structured artifacts such as TARAs that reflect the security analysis performed (previous bullet) and help guide the company's efforts in the cybersecurity domain.

You've probably got the whole ride-sharing thing figured out. Call a taxi or Uber, climb into the back seat, chat with the driver a bit, and be on your way. If anything goes wrong, the driver can alert you to what's up. They might already be talking your ear off anyway. All that helpful interaction goes out the automatic window if the driver behind the wheel is a robot.