Apple continues its test of self-driving technology, and in order to do so, they are starting a small fleet. It will consist of cars from Hertz Global Holdings Inc, and it will serve for further testing. Thanks to this new agreement, Hertz shares have gone higher than ever in the last two years.
According to the documents that were recently released by the California Department of Motor Vehicles, Apple will use one of Hertz’s Donlen fleet-management units, a sport-utility vehicle called Lexus RX450h. According to the document, Apple is leasing Donlen since it received the testing license for three self-driving cars back in April.
Both Apple and Hertz are keeping their potential comments about this to themselves. What is known, however, is that multiple cars have been testing Apple’s self-driving tech for about a year now. The tests were conducted on public roads in the San Francisco Bay, as well as around it.
And as for Hertz, its stock dropped a lot in the last year. The exact drop exceeds 75%, mostly due to falling profit and revenue. Investors have been concerned about increased popularity of self-driving technology, as well as rental companies. The situation was bad for Hertz, which is why they couldn’t wait to accept Apple’s offer to make an agreement. Because of this, the company’s gain went up for over 18%, which is its greatest rise since 2015.
Apple has recently had their own car problems, and especially during the last year or so. The costs went much higher than anticipated, and so did the headcount. Because of it, an executive Bob Mansfield has taken over the team.
His approach was fast and brutal. He quickly studied the situation and decided that cutting staff is necessary. Mansfield has also pointed out that developing a self-driving technology is more important currently than building an entire car. With these new instructions, as well as staff reduction, it appears that Apple is back on track.
Mansfield’s instructions and approach have been greatly appreciated and acknowledged within the company. Even Tim Cook, the Chief Executive Officer, has accepted this system. He admitted that it was better to purely focus on the automotive efforts and that creating entire vehicle is too much of a distraction for company’s efforts.
