Uber And Arrival To Develop Electric Car Specifically For E-Hailing Industry

E-hailing pioneer Uber will be partnering with UK electric vehicle (EV) company Arrival to develop an affordable electric car specifically made for e-hailing drivers. The new vehicle is expected to enter production in the third quarter of 2023 (Q3 2023).

Arrival said it would be involving Uber drivers in the design process over the coming months to ensure the vehicle meets the needs of working drivers and their passengers. The company expects to unveil the final design for the car before the end of this year.

Uber’s involvement here seems natural, given the launch of its Clean Air Plan two years ago. The company said it has raised over £135 million (~RM775.8 million) to help drivers with the cost of switching to a fully electric vehicle. It has committed to becoming a fully electric mobility platform in London by 2025 and across North America and Europe by 2030.

The e-hailing pioneer recently launched Uber Green in London, allowing passengers to select a fully electric vehicle at no extra cost, while drivers pay a lower service fee. The company wants to double the number of drivers in EVs by the end of this year as part of its efforts to make all cars on its app fully electric by 2025.

Genesis Celebrates Arrival In China With Over 3000 Drones; Claims New World Record

Rather than featuring fireworks to celebrate its official arrival in China, Hyundai subsidiary Genesis had decided to go for something more spectacular: a fully controllable light show in the sky. The Korean luxury car brand lit up the Shanghai skyline with a whopping 3,281 aerial drones on 29 March, breaking the current Guinness World Record for “The Most Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) airborne simultaneously.”

The drone-based light show demonstrated an impressive display of formations, including a rendition of Genesis’ logo, 3D-like wireframes of its G80 and GV80 car models, greetings, and much more. You can view highlights of the showcase in the video embedded below.

Prior to this, the record holder for the title was China’s own Shenzhen Damoda Intelligent Control Technology, which used 3,050 drones last year on 20 September. According to Guinness, Russian UAV manufacturer Geoscan and US chipmaker Intel preceded that record with a total of 2,200 and 2,066 units respectively.

Speaking of the latter, Intel opened for the Winter Olympics with a showcase of 1,218 drones back in 2018, where it claimed the same Guinness World Record at that time. The company also provided an aerial light show in Malaysia for last year’s New Year Eve celebrations at Dataran Merdeka, although only approximately 300 drones were used.

Despite the smaller number used for the local celebration, the cost for the showcase itself was recorded to top at least US$ 225K (~RM 919,710). With that in mind, one could only imagine the amount of money spent for the aforementioned demonstrations that feature even more drones – especially by Genesis.