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Hi everybody. Welcome to Shift, a podcast about mobility. I'm Pete Bigelow, your

host and reporter at the Automotive News. The past week has been filled with seismic developments involving Cruz, one of the

Robotaxi industry's most prominent companies. The California Department of Motor

Vehicles suspended Cruz's driverless testing and deployment permits last Tuesday.

The DMV charges that cruise vehicles are unsafe to the public and it has concerns over the company's technical competence.

Perhaps worse, the DMV has concerns over the company's technical competence.

Perhaps worse, the DMV alleges

crews withheld safety information following a pedestrian collision

in early October.

Cruz disputes that. Then on Thursday night, Cruz announced it was

pausing all its driverless operations across the country. This came only one

week after the company unveiled its grandest ambitions yet, which involved launching its

origin robot taxi in Tokyo. Here to discuss all of this with me today is Bryant Walker Smith,

a University of South Carolina law professor who's been a long time

leader in the self-driving space.

Bryant co-authored SAE levels of automation.

He drafted a model law that states have used to address the legalities around automated driving and he's written extensively about what it means for a company to be considered trustworthy.

Brian is here today to help us understand the severity of the problems

...