Google has roped in former Hyundai CEO John Krafcik, an auto industry veteran to lead its self driving car project. He will take over as the CEO of Google’s ambitious project by end of this month. Krafcik confirmed his appointment on his official Twitter account.
Prior to joining Google, Krafcik has been president of TrueCar Inc.,an online auto-buying service, and before that led Hyundai Motor Co.’s U.S. operations. Krafcik served as the CEO of Hyundai Motor America from 2008 to 2013, following a fourteen-year stint at Ford in product development. The news comes a week after Google’s announcement that it is set to increase manufacturing of its self-driving car prototypes.
Google has been testing its self-driving cars on public roads in recent months and they were spotted on the streets of Mountain View, California, and Austin, Texas. Chris Urmson, who has been head of the self-driving car program since 2009, will continue overseeing the project as its technical lead. This is the first major hiring done by Google for its self driving car project which hints that the company is getting serious about driverless car to make them more widely accepted. Google’s autonomous vehicles—25 Lexus SUVs and five prototypes that come with no steering wheel or pedals are covering 10,000 miles a week on public roads in selected states of the US.