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A Waymo rider-only robotaxi is seen during a test ride in San Francisco, California, U.S., December 9, 2022. 

Paresh Dave | Reuters

Waymo has filed a voluntary recall notice with federal vehicle safety regulators for software that was previously used in their driverless cars, the company announced Tuesday, marking a first for Alphabet‘s self-driving vehicle unit.

In a company blog post Tuesday, Waymo said the company chose to do the voluntary recall after consulting with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and its internal review of two incidents which took place in Phoenix on Dec. 11, 2023, in which two robotaxis crashed into the same towed pickup truck within minutes of each other.

The NHTSA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The two collisions involving their robotaxis resulted in only minor vehicle damage and no injuries, Waymo said in the post. No passengers were in the vehicles, according to the post.

Waymo spokesperson Katherine Barna said Waymo’s automated driving system, or ADS, incorrectly predicted the “future motion of a towed vehicle,” and the company’s voluntary recall included updating its software to address this issue. The company updated the software when the cars were returned to Waymo depots for regular maintenance and recharging, not over-the-air or through remote software updates, Barna added.

The software updates were completed by Jan. 12 and did not interrupt Waymo’s ride-hailing service, Barna said.

Waymo currently operates its driverless ride-hailing service Waymo One in Phoenix, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Austin. The company has approximately 700 vehicles total in the Waymo One fleet, with a couple hundred cars in each of its fully autonomous Waymo One service areas, Barna stated.

In recent months, some public backlash has arisen over driverless vehicles and how they are being tested and rolled out on public roads, following collisions and concerns over the impact of automation on drivers’ jobs.

Waymo has generally faced the least of public criticism, owing in part to its public affairs communications with agencies like NHTSA and local first responders. Waymo says it has driven 10 million fully autonomous miles and served over one million ride-hail trips.

However, in the fourth-quarter of 2023, the California Department of Motor Vehicles suspended the deployment and testing permits it had previously issued to Waymo competitor Cruise, which is owned by GM.

The revocation of those licenses followed an Oct. 2, 2023 incident in which a pedestrian in San Francisco was dragged 20 feet by a Cruise robotaxi after first being struck by a separate, human-driven vehicle.

Another would-be Waymo competitor, Tesla, has yet to deliver an automated driving system (ADS) or robotaxi although CEO Elon Musk promised that a self-driving Tesla would be able to navigate across the U.S. without any human interventions by the end of 2017. Instead, Tesla sells advanced driver assistance systems that it markets as “Autopilot” and “Full Self-Driving” options.

The California DMV has filed formal accusations against Tesla saying that the company’s marketing and advertising is deceptive.

Last week, a driverless Waymo car collided with a cyclist in San Francisco, causing minor injuries and the incident is now being reviewed by the state’s auto regulator.

In a separate incident, unknown parties set a Waymo vehicle ablaze on Saturday in San Francisco’s Chinatown during Lunar New Year celebrations. No group has yet claimed responsibility for the destruction of the Waymo car. Authorities are investigating who the responsible parties are, according to reports by NBC Bay Area.

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Google agrees to pay Texas $1.4 billion data privacy settlement

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Google agrees to pay Texas .4 billion data privacy settlement

A Google corporate logo hangs above the entrance to the company’s office at St. John’s Terminal in New York City on March 11, 2025.

Gary Hershorn | Corbis News | Getty Images

Google agreed to pay nearly $1.4 billion to the state of Texas to settle allegations of violating the data privacy rights of state residents, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said Friday.

Paxton sued Google in 2022 for allegedly unlawfully tracking and collecting the private data of users.

The attorney general said the settlement, which covers allegations in two separate lawsuits against the search engine and app giant, dwarfed all past settlements by other states with Google for similar data privacy violations.

Google’s settlement comes nearly 10 months after Paxton obtained a $1.4 billion settlement for Texas from Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, to resolve claims of unauthorized use of biometric data by users of those popular social media platforms.

“In Texas, Big Tech is not above the law,” Paxton said in a statement on Friday.

“For years, Google secretly tracked people’s movements, private searches, and even their voiceprints and facial geometry through their products and services. I fought back and won,” said Paxton.

“This $1.375 billion settlement is a major win for Texans’ privacy and tells companies that they will pay for abusing our trust.”

Google spokesman Jose Castaneda said the company did not admit any wrongdoing or liability in the settlement, which involves allegations related to the Chrome browser’s incognito setting, disclosures related to location history on the Google Maps app, and biometric claims related to Google Photo.

Castaneda said Google does not have to make any changes to products in connection with the settlement and that all of the policy changes that the company made in connection with the allegations were previously announced or implemented.

“This settles a raft of old claims, many of which have already been resolved elsewhere, concerning product policies we have long since changed,” Castaneda said.

“We are pleased to put them behind us, and we will continue to build robust privacy controls into our services.”

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Virtual chronic care company Omada Health files for IPO

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Virtual chronic care company Omada Health files for IPO

Omada Health smart devices in use.

Courtesy: Omada Health

Virtual care company Omada Health filed for an IPO on Friday, the latest digital health company that’s signaled its intent to hit the public markets despite a turbulent economy.

Founded in 2012, Omada offers virtual care programs to support patients with chronic conditions like prediabetes, diabetes and hypertension. The company describes its approach as a “between-visit care model” that is complementary to the broader health-care ecosystem, according to its prospectus.

Revenue increased 57% in the first quarter to $55 million, up from $35.1 million during the same period last year, the filing said. The San Francisco-based company generated $169.8 million in revenue during 2024, up 38% from $122.8 million the previous year.

Omada’s net loss narrowed to $9.4 million during its first quarter from $19 million during the same period last year. It reported a net loss of $47.1 million in 2024, compared to a $67.5 million net loss during 2023.

The IPO market has been largely dormant across the tech sector for the past three years, and within digital health, it’s been almost completely dead. After President Donald Trump announced a sweeping tariff policy that plunged U.S. markets into turmoil last month, taking a company public is an even riskier endeavor. Online lender Klarna delayed its long-anticipated IPO, as did ticket marketplace StubHub.

But Omada Health isn’t the first digital health company to file for its public market debut this year. Virtual physical therapy startup Hinge Health filed its prospectus in March, and provided an update with its first-quarter earnings on Monday, a signal to investors that it’s looking to forge ahead.

Omada contracts with employers, and the company said it works with more than 2,000 customers and supports 679,000 members as of March 31. More than 156 million Americans suffer from at least one chronic condition, so there is a significant market opportunity, according to the company’s filing.

In 2022, Omada announced a $192 million funding round that pushed its valuation above $1 billion. U.S. Venture Partners, Andreessen Horowitz and Fidelity’s FMR LLC are the largest outside shareholders in the company, each owning between 9% and 10% of the stock.

“To our prospective shareholders, thank you for learning more about Omada. I invite you join our journey,” Omada co-founder and CEO Sean Duffy said in the filing. “In front of us is a unique chance to build a promising and successful business while truly changing lives.”

WATCH: The IPO market is likely to pick up near Labor Day, says FirstMark’s Rick Heitzmann

The IPO market is likely to pick up near Labor Day, says FirstMark's Rick Heitzmann

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Google would need to shift up to 2,000 employees for antitrust remedies, search head says

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Google would need to shift up to 2,000 employees for antitrust remedies, search head says

Liz Reid, vice president, search, Google speaks during an event in New Delhi on December 19, 2022.

Sajjad Hussain | AFP | Getty Images

Testimony in Google‘s antitrust search remedies trial that wrapped hearings Friday shows how the company is calculating possible changes proposed by the Department of Justice.

Google head of search Liz Reid testified in court Tuesday that the company would need to divert between 1,000 and 2,000 employees, roughly 20% of Google’s search organization, to carry out some of the proposed remedies, a source with knowledge of the proceedings confirmed.

The testimony comes during the final days of the remedies trial, which will determine what penalties should be taken against Google after a judge last year ruled the company has held an illegal monopoly in its core market of internet search.

The DOJ, which filed the original antitrust suit and proposed remedies, asked the judge to force Google to share its data used for generating search results, such as click data. It also asked for the company to remove the use of “compelled syndication,” which refers to the practice of making certain deals with companies to ensure its search engine remains the default choice in browsers and smartphones. 

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Google pays Apple billions of dollars per year to be the default search engine on iPhones. It’s lucrative for Apple and a valuable way for Google to get more search volume and users.

Apple’s SVP of Services Eddy Cue testified Wednesday that Apple chooses to feature Google because it’s “the best search engine.”

The DOJ also proposed the company divest its Chrome browser but that was not included in Reid’s initial calculation, the source confirmed.

Reid on Tuesday said Google’s proprietary “Knowledge Graph” database, which it uses to surface search results, contains more than 500 billion facts, according to the source, and that Google has invested more than $20 billion in engineering costs and content acquisition over more than a decade.

“People ask Google questions they wouldn’t ask anyone else,” she said, according to the source.

Reid echoed Google’s argument that sharing its data would create privacy risks, the source confirmed.

Closing arguments for the search remedies trial will take place May 29th and 30th, followed by the judge’s decision expected in August.

The company faces a separate remedies trial for its advertising tech business, which is scheduled to begin Sept. 22.

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