According to Austin American Statesman sources this evening, Google has signed to lease all 35 floors of a forthcoming tower that’s already broken ground in downtown Austin, Texas. It will be located, unsurprisingly, right next door to Google’s existing Austin offices.
In case you’re unaware, Google publishes a sometimes interesting but usually mundane report on its self-driving car project every month. Last month the company detailed its mapping system and a minor accident in Austin, and this month the April report describes the experience of one of its test drivers as well as two more accidents — neither of which were Google’s fault.
Google’s self-driving car project first came to Austin, Texas in July of last year, marking its first expansion outside of Google’s hometown of Mountain View, California. It was a logical next step, considering Austin’s forward-thinking political culture and unique environmental challenges (“pedicabs, pickup trucks, and everything in between,” Google said). Now, it appears—thanks to some recently-published FCC documents (via Mark Harris)—that Google has plans to bring the self-driving car program to four more mysterious cities…
Up to June of this year, Google’s self-driving cars had yet to be at fault in any accidents, and it seems that record has held true over the last few months. Of the dozen or so accidents up to that point, the majority had happened when the self-driving car wasn’t even moving, and the rest occurred when Google’s safety drivers were in control of the vehicles.
Unfortunately, in the months after Google released the first report, Google’s cars continued to see a couple of accidents per month. But that trend has come to an interesting halt recently. As we’ve learned thanks to Google’s recently-published October report, the self-driving cars have now gone more than two months without a single accident…
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Google releases a report about its self-driving car project every month, and now the company has released October’s numbers. There’s not much new information this time around, but numbers like miles driven in both autonomous and manual modes have obviously increased. Interestingly, while the number of self-driving cars on the road has stayed the same, the number of cars on the road in Austin, TX has decreased…
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Starting on January 1st, Ontario will become the first province in Canada to open its roads to testing of automated vehicles, according to a recent report (via CBC). The province will allow testing of self-driving cars (Google has been a pioneer in the space with both its Lexus models and its smaller, prototype EVs), as well as “related technologies,” starting on January 1st 2016…
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When Google originally showcased the newer low-speed “cute-mobile” self-driving car, it mentioned a goal of having about 100 of them on the road for testing within a couple years. Now, as the company is bringing its low-speed electric prototypes to Austin a year later, Sarah Hunter, head of policy for Google [X], has revealed that the company is expanding production of the cars (via The Guardian). Hunter says that Google is now producing at least a “few hundred” and hints at a potential future of mass-production…
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Google today has announced that it is expanding its custom self-driving car project to Austin, Texas. Previously, the company had only been allowing the car to roam the streets of California. Google now says, however, that it is brining “a few” of its self-driving cars to Texas. The cars will stay in the northern part of Austin, like its modified Lexus vehicles have been for the last several months.
The accident record of Google’s self-driving cars speaks for itself, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t still bugs to be worked out. Ironically, though, one of those bugs demonstrates just how capable the cars are.
When one of the cars encountered a cyclist doing a trackstand (balancing while stationary by making tiny back-and-forth movements) at a four-way stop, the car came to a halt every time the cyclist moved forward an inch or so. The recent encounter in Austin, Texas, was described by the cyclist on web forum Road Bike Review …
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Even though Google announced in December of last year that sign-ups for its Fiber TV and Internet service were live to residents of southern and southeastern Austin, they’ve actually been opened and closed several times. Sign-ups are going live in the southeastern section yet again today, according to the official Twitter account for the company’s broadband cable and Internet subsidiary.
If you live in Austin, Texas, and thought you spotted one of Google’s self-driving cars, you weren’t imagining things: the company confirmed today that it has chosen the city for the next phase of testing. Google said in a G+ post that it was important for the software to be tested in a variety of different driving environments.
We’ve chosen Austin, Texas, as a new testing location for our project, and one of our Lexus SUVs is there now, with safety drivers aboard, driving a few square miles north and northeast of downtown Austin. It’s important for us to get experience testing our software in different driving environments, traffic patterns and road conditions—so we’re ready to take on Austin’s pedicabs, pickup trucks, and everything in between.
Google first demonstrated the car to the city’s mayor, chief of police and other officials back in 2013 …
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After revealing pricing last week, Google has today opened signups for Fiber in Austin, Texas. Google is starting its Austin rollout by opening signups in the southern and southeastern sections of the city. The company will expand the rollout to other portions of Austin “on an ongoing basis.” Both residents and small businesses in the pre-determined Fiberhoods can signup for the service today.
Google today has finally revealed its pricing plans for Fiber in Austin, Texas. The company plans to open up sign-ups for the internet service next month in the city, and while it was previously believed that Fiber in Austin would cost the same as it does in Kansas City and Provo, the company announced today that there are some slight variations (via Multichannel).
Google Fiber is about ready to launch in its third city, according to The Wall Street Journal. The service is apparently about 3 months behind original schedule, and sign ups will be launched this December focusing on the south and southeastern parts of the city. The company’s original announcement touted “mid-2014” for launch, but it looks like laying groundwork for a fiber internet service isn’t exactly an easy task.
Google will add Provo, Utah, to the list of cities set to receive its ultra high speed Google Fiber Internet service.
Austin, Texas was revealed earlier this month to be joining Kansas City as host to Google Fiber.
The announcement by Provo Mayor John Curtis will be live streamed at 3:30 PM EST.
Following Google’s announcement that it will bring its speedy Google Fiber network to Austin, Texas, in mid-2014, AT&T has created competition by announcing it plans to bring fiber-optic internet connectivity to the Lone Star state as well.
Today, AT&T announced that in conjunction with its previously announced Project VIP expansion of broadband access, it is prepared to build an advanced fiber optic infrastructure in Austin, Texas, capable of delivering speeds up to 1 gigabit per second. AT&T’s expanded fiber plans in Austin anticipate it will be granted the same terms and conditions as Google on issues such as geographic scope of offerings, rights of way, permitting, state licenses and any investment incentives. This expanded investment is not expected to materially alter AT&T’s anticipated 2013 capital expenditures.
AT&T says it believes it will be granted the same privileges as Google in this regard. The full press release is available below:
We already knew that Google was getting set to announce its Gigabit Google Fiber Internet service for Austin, Texas today after an initial successful launch in Kansas last November. Reports claimed invites started going out this month, but today Google has officially announced Google Fiber will be coming to Austin, Texas by mid-2014.
Google noted that pricing would be similar to Kansas, and it will also be offering customers in Austin the same free Internet connection at 5 mbps for 7 years with a one time installation fee:
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[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=HhD5oFYG_1k]
We noted last week that carrier-backed Google Wallet competitor Isis was nearing an official launch when we noticed the T-Mobile ISIS app on Google Play. Today, the app officially launches on all three of its major carrier partners in Salt Lake City, Utah and Austin, Texas. ISIS issued a press release on its website today to confirm the service would be available to nine “Isis Ready” handsets through Verizon, T-Mobile, and AT&T. It will also land on a total of 20 devices by the end of 2012.
“Today’s launch of the Isis Mobile Wallet is a significant achievement in terms of enabling consumer adoption of mobile payments,” said Suzan Kereere, senior vice president and general manager, American Express, Global Network Business. “Mobile commerce holds the promise of dramatically enhancing consumers’ shopping experience, and American Express’ first priority as a network is to provide choice and flexibility for all industry participants as we work together to influence the speed and growth of mobile NFC payments in the U.S.”
The service will be made available to compatible devices, which the press release failed to list, and it can be activated with a secure element SIM card at one of the partner carrier’s retail stores in Austin and Salt Lake City. We know on T-Mobile you’ll be able to use at least the Galaxy S III and Galaxy Relay 4G. You can see Verizon’s selection here. Isis also has a full list of participating merchants here.
Like T-Mobile, ISIS apps for both Verizon and AT&T are now available on Google Play.
The full press release from Isis is below:
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