Uber has been criticized for its lack of wheelchair-accessible vehicles, but that'll soon be changing thanks to a new partnership with MV Transportation. Under the new arrangement, Uber will add hundreds of wheelchair-accessible vehicles in the future, deploying them in half a dozen of the markets where it operates.
Uber has launched a new rewards program called Uber Rewards. The program is designed to reward customers for using the ride-sharing service and comes only days after Lyft unveiled its own similar plan. Uber Rewards applies to both Uber and Uber Eats, enabling riders to unlock perks across a total of four membership levels.
Uber has introduced a new service called Ride Pass, a solution to its frustrating surge pricing that leaves commuters wondering what their daily bill will be. With Ride Pass, Uber riders can lock in a rate, which is consistently applied for rides taken anywhere in their city. The new payment option is intended for people who use Uber for regular rides, such as to work or back home after the day ends.
Uber has decided to make London the first city where all of its vehicles will be electric, a move that will reduce pollution while offering the public ample green transportation options. The transition will take place by 2025 and include charging riders an electric car fee. This news follows the company's ban in the city, something that changed only recently.
Uber may be gearing up to launch a new business that has nothing to do with transportation. According to a new report, the company is working on "Uber Works," an alleged temporary staffing business that provides companies with on-demand short-term workers. Though Uber has declined to comment on the matter, the report claims it is increasing its work on the project.
Uber has updated its mobile app with a new way for riders and drivers to talk with each other: VoIP. The new calling feature is akin to Skype, but exclusively for users who want to chat with their driver in a personal manner. The new feature joins the existing ability to send SMS and in-app text-based chat messages.
Uber has announced a new move toward "urban sustainability" and efforts that will help improve the cities in which it operates. Among the efforts is a new sustainable mobility fund; the company has pledged to put $10 million toward ideas that'll benefit the public interest in the future. As well, the company plans to launch electric charging stations for dockless, shared e-bikes.
Toyota and Uber have announced that they are extending their collaboration agreement in the autonomous auto realm. The deal will see Toyota invest $500 million into Uber. Uber plans to integrate its self-driving tech alongside the Toyota Guardian technology in vehicles built specifically for the Uber ride-sharing network. Toyota and Uber want to bring autonomous ride-sharing to the masses at scale.
Uber is tapping AI to help determine whether a customer is taking a trip for business or pleasure. This will be a convenience feature for riders who use Uber for both their working and recreational life, helping avoid mistakes that result in business trips being charged to personal credit cards, for example. The feature relies on machine learning.
Uber Elevate has teamed up with UT Austin and US Army Research Labs as part of its uberAIR project, which envisions an urban-based ride-share aviation network. Uber Elevate intends to launch in three cities with demonstrations starting in 2020; both Los Angeles and Dallas are two of those launch cities and a third one is being sought internationally. If everything goes as planned, uberAIR will start commercial operations in 2023.
Uber has spent a couple years working on "the future of trucking," a project involving autonomous long-haul trucks intended for commercial transportation. Despite the work already put into the plan, Uber has decided to change its business focus, shuttering the autonomous truck project in the process. Engineers from the trucking unit will be moved over to the self-driving cars project.
Earlier this year, Uber took its self-driving cars off the road after an accident resulted in the death of a pedestrian in Tempe, Arizona. At the time, Uber promised significant changes to the autonomous hardware and software in those cars and announced plans to put them back on the road at some point during the summer. Today, Uber revealed that its self-driving cars will soon return to Pittsburgh, but when they hit the road again, they'll be under close watch by the company's mission specialists.