GM, which owns about 90 percent of Cruise, has agreements with other shareholders that will raise its ownership to more than 97 percent. The company will pursue the acquisition of the remaining shares. After which GM will combine Cruise and its own technical teams into a single unit to advance autonomous and assisted driving stemming from Super Cruise, the company’s hands-off, eyes-on driving feature, which is now offered on more than 20 GM vehicle models.

GM bought a 90 percent controlling stake in Cruise for USD 581 million in 2016, only for the robotaxi service to pile up more than USD 10 billion in operating losses and generating less than USD 500 million in revenue.

Cruise faced scrutiny after one of its self-driving taxis dragged a San Francisco pedestrian who was hit by another vehicle in 2023. It was also alleged that Cruise then covered up details of the crash for more than two weeks.

This decision to pull the plug may affect Honda’s own autonomous vehicles research which it planned as a collaboration with it and Cruise. In 2021, the carmaker started testing its self-driving mobility services fleet in Utsunomiya City and Haga Town in Tochigi. In 2026, it was supposed to launch Cruise Origin which it previewed in the Japan Mobility Show.

GM’s pull out in the driverless taxi business is the latest in a string of pullbacks from American automakers. Ford disbanded its own Argo AI that it co-owned with Volkswagen two years ago.