SAN FRANCISCO — General Motors-owned Cruise announced a new CEO Tuesday, as the embattled autonomous car company works to restart its driverless taxi service after grounding its entire fleet in the wake of a grisly accident last year.
Marc Whitten, previously an executive at video game development platform Unity and a founder of Microsoft’s Xbox service division, will take over at a precarious time for Cruise. The company halted its entire driverless fleet across the U.S. last year after one of its autonomous cars operating in San Francisco hit and dragged a jaywalking pedestrian who was flung into its path by a human driver. California regulators suspended Cruise’s permits to operate its driverless fleet in the state, throwing the company into a crisis that included mass layoffs and the resignation of its former CEO, Kyle Vogt.
