In a case that could potentially set a landmark precedent, a motorcyclist is taking GM to court for its role in a 2017 collision between the rider and a self-driving Chevrolet Bolt EV. The vehicle involved is part of GM’s self-driving Cruise Anywhere ride-sharing fleet that it hopes will soon...Read More»
A law firm that has carved out a reputation for aggressively pursuing automakers over diesel emissions has found a new target: Ford's heavy-duty pickups. The suit comes just days after Ford announced details for its upcoming F-150 diesel and is the latest in a string of accusations following VW's...Read More»
It is, perhaps, human nature to harbor grandiose dreams of fighting a traffic ticket, even to the point of arguing before a local judge. For the past four years, however, an Oregon man has taken that fantasy to extreme levels, ultimately resulting in the state’s senior assistant attorney...Read More»
If you read that headline and thought that Uber might be off the hook for making use of information stolen from Waymo/Google, think again. It's true that the autonomous car start-up has dropped 75 percent of its patent claims in the increasingly messy court battle. The suit has centered on...Read More»
It's been nearly three weeks since the messy legal battle between ride-sharing giant Uber and self-driving car company Waymo made headlines, but rest assured, all is not quiet on the West Coast front. Yesterday, Uber finally fired the engineer at the center of the contentious court case, Anthony...Read More»
Ford Fiesta and Focus owners are so unhappy with the PowerShift transmissions in their cars, they're taking the automaker to court. Sadly, it won't be the first time that Ford has been sued over the dual-clutch transmission, which was first installed in new vehicles back in 2010. Previous cases...Read More»
Today's auto news headlines read like a warped version of Oprah Winfrey's infamous car giveaway: "You're getting sued for excess diesel emissions! And you're getting sued for excess diesel emissions! Everyone's getting sued for excess diesel emissions!" We say that because General Motors is now...Read More»
Last Thursday, we reported that after months of back-and-forth between Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the California Air Resources Board, FCA was about to be slapped with a federal lawsuit. The cause? Excess emissions from more than 100,000 Jeep Grand Cherokee...Read More»
Fiat Chrysler Automobiles hasn't exactly been ahead of the curve on developing electric cars. Nor has it done much work on self-driving vehicles (though its partnership with Waymo has picked up some of the slack). But when it comes to predicting lawsuits, FCA is batting 1000. Back in March, FCA's...Read More»
Grab the popcorn and set your phone to vibrate: the messy lawsuit between Waymo (aka Google's self-driving car project) and Uber (aka the ride-sharing company that needs another bad headline like Mark Zuckerberg needs another million dollars) is going to play out in public. If you're already...Read More»
Uber's race to develop fleets of self-driving cars and big rigs has hit another speed bump: yesterday, the head of its autonomous vehicle program stepped down from his post in the wake of a complicated lawsuit. The move isn't especially surprising. A recap For nearly nine years, Anthony Levandowksi...Read More»
Uber has been experiencing its own brand of hell for the past several months. Complaints about mistreatment of female and LGBT employees, allegations of trade-secret theft, faulty self-driving software, its tone-deaf manchild CEO: headlines about these and other unsavory matters have fueled a...Read More»
Today's auto news headlines are dominated by stories about self-driving cars, ride-sharing companies, and exploding airbags. But just three years ago, ignition switches were the dominant topic of conversation--specifically faulty ignition switches manufactured by General Motors. You might've...Read More»
Not so long ago, someone might've looked at that headline and thought we'd lost our minds, or at least fallen asleep on the keyboard. These days, though, we're all too familiar with what each of those words means and what's at stake as two of the biggest players in the field of self-driving cars go...Read More»
Since Tesla Autopilot debuted in the fall of 2015, it's earned plenty of fans and foes. The former love the safety and convenience offered by the semi-self-driving system, while the latter complain that Tesla foisted dangerous beta software on owners who didn't ask for it. This week, Autopilot...Read More»
Good product design is easy to overlook. When a product is truly well crafted, the design becomes invisible because it's so intuitive. We think, "Well, of course it looks like that. How could it look any other way?" On the other hand, bad design--or sometimes, a radical redesign--can often...Read More»
Back in the early days of the Volkswagen Dieselgate fiasco, we estimated that the crisis would cost Europe's largest automaker at least $25 billion. As it turns out, that estimate may have been too conservative. The company's bill in America alone has topped $22 billion, and thanks to a settlement...Read More»
It's been over a month since we heard about Takata's proposed billion-dollar settlement to end an investigation by U.S. officials into charges of criminal wrongdoing. Yesterday in Detroit, District Court Judge George Steeh formally approved that proposal. Most of the funds that Takata ponies...Read More»
Earlier this week, Chevrolet announced some impressive fuel economy figures for its newest Cruze Diesel sedan. Meanwhile, a federal court in Michigan has given nine owners of previous Cruze Diesels the green light to continue their joint lawsuit against Chevrolet and its parent company, General...Read More»
