Darrell Etherington

Editor at Large, TechCrunch

Writer covering space, science and health tech. Formerly covering automotive and mobility tech, and previously an employee of Apple and also of Shopify.

Darrell Etherington

Connected city infrastructure and cars that talk back could potentially do a lot to help ease traffic conditions, but in the meantime, the city of Montréal in Quebec, Canada is…

Here’s how Montréal is turning to Bluetooth to address traffic congestion

A former smartphone powerhouse wants to be an instrumental part of the coming smart car revolution, and BlackBerry is deepening its investment int he field with a new autonomous driving…

BlackBerry opens a research center for self-driving tech in Canada

Waymo, the newly-minted Alphabet company that was previously Google’s self-driving car project, has a new addition to its vehicle fleet: 100 Chrysler Pacifica hybrid minivans, which were produced by Fiat…

Here’s our first look at Waymo’s new self-driving Chrysler Pacifica minivans

The California Department of Motor Vehicles sent Uber a notice asking it to terminate its pilot self-driving car service in San Francisco last week, but Uber has continued to operate…

California Attorney General gives Uber notice on self-driving cars in San Francisco

Multi-CEO and future builder Elon Musk may have been so frustrated by sitting in traffic that he’s going to start yet another company – a boring one. Yes, boring – as in…

Elon Musk might start a literal “boring company” to tunnel under traffic

It’s become a well-trod refrain, but carmakers are looking at what comes after ownership, and car-sharing between individual owners and renters is one of those models. Mercedes-Benz has begun its…

Mercedes-Benz debuts Croove, its own car-sharing network

If you are one of the lucky few who either managed to get an NES Classic Edition already, or who will likely be getting one this holiday as a gift,…

8Bitdo’s NES30 and Retro Receiver for NES Classic is the ideal wireless controller

GM is going to start building its next generation of self-driving vehicles at the Michigan plant where it builds its Chevrolet Bolt, the company’s CEO Mary Barra announced Thursday. It…

GM will begin testing and building self-driving cars in Michigan

If there’s one thing I consistently love and can be trusted to both enjoy free or even pay money for, it’s fireplace videos. Sometimes called yule log videos, too, these…

Marvel just released 5 hours of superhero holiday fireplace videos

PlayStation has a new Bluetooth wireless headset, an over-ear pair of headphones that’s launching January 12 for $159.99. The new cans are called the Platinum Wireless Headset, presumably to indicate how…

PlayStation’s new headset launches Jan. 12 with virtual surround and 3D audio

Carmakers are building alternative models to vehicle ownership like it’s going out of style (it probably is). Two of those side bets on collaborative transportation might be coming together, according to…

BMW and Daimler could bring their car-sharing services together

The Federal Communications Commission has been led by Chairman Tom Wheeler for the past three years, but Wheeler intends to end his run at the FCC on January 20, 2017.…

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler to step down in January 2017

BMW is doing something pretty sci-fi with the interior of its vehicles at CES – it’s showing off a new HoloActive Touch system, which is a touch sensitive display for…

BMW’s HoloActive Touch in-car interface offers tactile feedback on a floating display

Uber announced Thursday it will be deploying new hardware called Uber Beacon in select cities, starting in Miami, Denver, Nashville and Newcastle in the UK. The new piece of hardware…

Uber starts rolling out Beacon, a new color-coded windshield pickup signal

A lot of us have cars, but not a lot of us use cars – estimates suggest our cars are sitting unused as much as 95 percent of the time, which…

Car sharing network Turo launches in the UK

Uber has been ordered by state regulators to stop using self-driving cars in California, according to the Associated Press, at least until it secures the necessary permit issued by the…

Uber ordered to stop self-driving vehicle service in San Francisco

California-based Lucid Motors revealed its first car today, a fully electric sedan aimed at the “executive” market, with a 400-mile range rating from its onboard 100kWh battery, a 2.5-second 0-60…

Lucid Motors unveils the Air, a new luxe electric car with a 400-mile range

Update 7 PM ET- An Uber spokesperson says the incident in the video above was definitely caused by an error on the part of a human driver – full statement:…

Uber says self-driving car ran red light due to “human error”

Facebook is looking into the possibility of buying its own video content from creative partners, including original scripted and unscripted shows, as well as sports. The desire is to help…

Facebook exploring creation of its own original video content

Airbus debuted Project Vahana earlier this year, an ambitious project designed with the specific intent of creating small, efficient vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) craft for use in dense urban…

Airbus’ Vahana VTOL project asks what vehicle makes for the best self-flying taxi

Uber launched a small fleet of self-driving vehicles in San Francisco on Tuesday, but the second city to host the public test of the ride-hailing company’s work in this area…

Uber’s San Francisco self-driving pilot draws criticism from California DMV

Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant is slowly making its way out into the world, via third-party hardware that’s using Amazon’s developer tools to build it into their own products. That’s the…

These new headphones let you talk to Amazon’s Alexa anywhere you go

The DxO One add-on camera accessory for iPhone really does get better with age; first, it gained remote Wi-Fi control, and now it’s announcing support for Facebook Live streaming directly within…

DxO One update will add multi-camera Facebook Live streaming

The autonomous cars won’t operate completely driverless, for the time being – as in Pittsburgh, where Uber launched self-driving Ford Focus vehicles this fall, each SUV will have a safety driver…

Uber’s self-driving cars start picking up passengers in San Francisco

Microsoft is making Cortana available to third-party device makers, and opening up the platform to third-party developers, too, so that they can integrate their own services in Cortana-powered devices. The…

Microsoft to open Cortana virtual assistant to third-party devices and apps

Udacity is positioned perfectly to benefit from the rush on talent in a number of growing areas of interest among tech companies and startups. The online education platform has added…

Udacity adds 14 hiring partners as AI, VR and self-driving talent wars heat up

Chevrolet has delivered its first three Bolt EVs to customers, making its success in delivering a long-range all-electric car available at a decent price official. The company’s first three customers are…

Chevrolet delivers its first Bolt EVs to customers

“We’re now an independent company within the Alphabet umbrella,” Waymo CEO John Krafcik told an audience at a press event in San Francisco today. Krafcik also noted that the Waymo team…

Google’s self-driving car unit becomes Waymo

The U.S. Department of Transportation wants all future cars in the U.S. to be able to talk to each other, with the aim of helping to prevent “hundreds of thousands”…

DOT proposes vehicle-to-vehicle comms requirement for new cars in the U.S.

Velodyne has a new LiDAR sensor design that could help bring an autonomous-driving future closer than ever; it’s a small, solid-sate design that has a cost of less than $50…

Velodyne’s latest solid-state LiDAR design keeps costs low for production at scale