Laurie Yoler has witnessed the transformation of autonomous vehicles (AVs) from sci-fi concept to on-the-road reality. Now a venture partner at Playground Global and a board member at multiple companies, Yoler has decades of industry experience, including early stints at Tesla and Zoox (the Amazon-owned robo-taxi start-up). These experiences have given her a front-row seat to the commercialization of self-driving technology.
Today, the AV sector is in a transitional phase. Companies such as Waymo operate commercial services with self-driving vehicles in a few cities, and driver-assistance systems have become more common. Fully autonomous vehicles remain far from mainstream, however, because technical and regulatory hurdles persist. Public trust is also still evolving. Even more change is coming as automakers, tech firms, and start-ups continue to make investments and create different visions for autonomy’s future.
At a recent McKinsey conference in California’s Carmel Valley, Yoler spoke with McKinsey Partner Emily Shao about the evolution of AVs, the challenges of deployment at scale, and how changing attitudes toward mobility may shape the future of transportation. An edited excerpt of their conversation follows.
A vision becomes reality
Emily Shao: What was the moment that made you believe AVs could become mainstream?
Laurie Yoler: AI has been around for a long time. I was playing with robots as a kid, thinking about how incredible actuation was—you give commands and suddenly you have this robot doing things autonomously, without remote control. Applying AI to vehicles is exciting but scary to some because it involves large vehicles moving around in cities and neighborhoods.
I started believing in AVs when I saw how software could transform vehicle architectures. I then looked at sensors deployed in phones and other technologies and learned how they allowed autonomous vehicles to “see” the world more broadly than humans can. And I saw how AI could be integrated into those vehicles to make magic happen.
I remember riding in one of the first Waymo prototypes with [Waymo cofounder] Sebastian Thrun. It was going through a very fast obstacle course, and I was screaming, thinking it was so exciting. When Zoox was starting up, it was clear that the technology worked and that there would be a number of phenomenal players. I also loved that both Waymo and Zoox were very focused on safety.
Emily Shao: What are some of the biggest challenges you’ve observed in AV development?
Laurie Yoler: Two things primarily. First, it’s large companies trying to grapple with this huge disruption. Second, it’s consumer confidence. I travel around the world and talk to consumers in different markets who say, “This will never make sense in my city for the following reasons.”
Regulators, too, think about safety and what this could do to their city. City, state, and federal legislators are trying to do the right thing, but fear this huge change, even though AVs are way safer—in the US, we still have 40,000 deaths a year that could be avoided by using AVs. That education takes a long time.
‘A huge generational shift’
Emily Shao: I’ve heard you talk about the changing attitudes toward driving among young people. Can you elaborate?
Laurie Yoler: There’s been a huge generational shift in interest in getting a driver’s license and driving. Young people today spend their time differently—many are on mobile phones or listening to music with headphones. It’s not this rite of passage of “I got my driver’s license and now I’m independent. Hallelujah, I can get out of the house.” Young people now have many other options for getting out of the house. I think the car as a symbol of freedom has waned a bit.
I had to beg my children to get their driver’s licenses because they felt it was taking on a lot of responsibility; they could get in an accident and hurt someone or themselves. In the 1980s, between 80 and 90 percent of 18-year-olds had driver’s licenses. Today, it’s closer to 50 percent. That’s a huge change.
The other 50 percent of 18-year-olds may be taking public transit, using ride-share services, riding bikes, or walking. And I see a lot of scooters and e-bikes, certainly in San Francisco and in cities throughout Europe. I see a lot of new vehicles that are not cars and that are not being driven. Many of them are electric, which is great for the environment. I’m not seeing as much interest in owning cars, especially in crowded cities where finding a parking place is very difficult.
Emily Shao: Today, AVs still look like regular cars. Thinking ahead to 2030 or 2035, what does the autonomous experience look and feel like for a rider?
Laurie Yoler: Since I’ve been working in this field, I’ve been called by many movie studios and game developers saying, “This is going to be great when we all have AVs. Everyone’s going to want to play games and watch movies.” I don’t know about that.
On an airplane, when there’s no turbulence, everyone is watching a movie or looking at a device. I love listening to music and podcasts in vehicles, so a voice interface and audio experiences absolutely make sense. How much we want visual experiences will depend on how rough the road is. There’s a lot of experimentation happening right now. I’ve seen so many concept cars that try to integrate full-length films so that people can start seeing an AV as a space to relax.
Maybe there are opportunities for new experiences in the AVs of the future. But being able to make a great phone call, not worry about the safety of the vehicle, and have personal time or time with friends is going to be excellent.
Business models and market transformation
Emily Shao: Are you seeing any indicators that mobility business models will need to change in the next decade?
Laurie Yoler: The whole industry has tried to move from just hardware and manufacturing—which requires a lot of scale to get costs down—to adding more software and services. Will we get to the software-defined vehicle? We’ve certainly seen that happen in China and with a lot of the new innovators.
Automakers are thinking about the question of new business models, especially with regard to AI. They’re asking, “Is my data valuable? Can I monetize that data? What will AI allow me to do? What are the new business models in and around the vehicle that are going to be exciting?”
Tesla, for example, looked at, “What else do consumers want?” Well, they want easy and fast charging. They want to be able to charge at home. They care about energy storage and clean energy for their vehicle. So, there are a number of different opportunities. In China, you see battery-swapping technologies.
Emily Shao: Speaking of China, what’s your perspective on how autonomy in China compares with the US, and how is the global landscape evolving?
Laurie Yoler: In China, there were many new entrants and a very supportive government encouraging innovation in the automotive sector. It had deep manufacturing expertise because the mobile phone industry was dominant there. But China had not traditionally been a huge automotive powerhouse, so Chinese AV companies were able to start with a blank sheet of paper, much like Tesla, Lucid, and Rivian were able to do with electric vehicles in the US.
Will we see vehicles going back and forth between the US and China as imports and exports? That will have a lot to do with geopolitics and what both governments allow.
Predictions about autonomy
Emily Shao: Do you see a future in which individuals own L4 autonomous vehicles?
Laurie Yoler: L4 doesn’t make as much sense in a passenger-owned vehicle. If you want to drive on weekends but want autonomy during the week, I think the L2++ safety features, such as lane keeping and accident avoidance, make sense.
True AVs are expensive. If you really want a safe AV, you’re getting into expensive sensors and lidar. The bill of materials makes it difficult to justify costs for vehicles sold to individual drivers. It’s great when they’re used all day long, and the robo-taxi use case ensures higher utilization. Individuals use their vehicles to get to work, get home, maybe drive on weekends, but the vehicles are just sitting there for much of the day.
Emily Shao: Your firm, Playground Global, focuses on deep-tech investments. Beyond self-driving cars, what emerging technologies in the mobility space excite you—and how do you think they might reshape the mobility landscape?
Laurie Yoler: We are interested in mobility at large. We’ve made investments in automotive technologies, such as driver-monitoring systems. Then we looked more broadly at applying sensors, actuation, and software to other exciting areas, including robotics and drones.
The mobility industry’s manufacturing and design talents can be applied to many different mobility modes. You’ve got ground, air, sea, and space—many different places to apply autonomous technologies.
Emily Shao: What’s your boldest prediction about how autonomy will impact our lives in the next 20 years?
Laurie Yoler: To me, the big questions are about robots: Are we just going to have robots in factories, or will we have personal helpers at home and work? Can we take all those technologies used in robo-taxis and phones and create personalized robots to help us throughout our lives?
Today, AI is enabling a lot. The speed of AI adoption and integration is amazing. With autonomy, you need the sensors, perception, and AI to push it forward rapidly. The software has to be fantastic for safety and other use cases. I think we still have a long way to go with autonomy more broadly—not just in vehicles, but in how autonomous technologies can transform our lives.
