Waymo is now delivering hundreds of thousands of fully autonomous rides each week — but getting there required more than better models. It meant building a complete system for training, evaluating, and deploying a driver in the real world. In this episode — originally aired on the Cheeky Pint podcast — Waymo Co-CEO Dmitri Dolgov joins John Collison to break down how self-driving actually works today: from sensor fusion across LiDAR, radar, and cameras, to simulation, “critic” models, and the role of AI in decision-making. They also explore why full autonomy is fundamentally different from driver-assist, what it takes to scale globally, and how recent advances in AI are reshaping the path forward. Resources: Follow Dmitri Dolgov on X - https://x.com/dmitri_dolgov Follow John Collison on X - https://x.com/collision Stay Updated: Find a16z on YouTube: YouTube Find a16z on X Find a16z on LinkedIn Listen to the a16z Show on Spotify Listen to the a16z Show on Apple Podcasts Follow our host: https://twitter.com/eriktorenberg Please note that the content here is for informational purposes only; should NOT be taken as legal, business, tax, or investment advice or be used to evaluate any investment or security; and is not directed at any investors or potential investors in any a16z fund. a16z and its affiliates may maintain investments in the companies discussed. For more details please see a16z.com/disclosures. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The System Behind Self-Driving: Waymo’s Dmitri Dolgov

The a16z Show

# Full Transcript

**Podcast:** The a16z Show

## Participants

- **John Collison** (a16z)
- **Dmitri Dolgov** (Waymo)

## Transcript

[SPEAKER_02] When you're driving around or being driven around, say, you know, we think about what we're building as a driver. I can imagine building a big model that understands how the physical world works and understands the important properties of what it means to drive, the social aspects of driving, and what it means to be a good driver as opposed to a bad one.

[SPEAKER_02] I would say that we've clearly moved past the stage of scientific research and deep core technology development to this new phase of accelerated global scaling and deployment.

[SPEAKER_03] Waymo is now doing nearly half a million fully autonomous rides a week across multiple cities, a shift from long-term research to real-world scale. In this episode, originally aired on the Cheeky Pint podcast, Waymo co-CEO Dmitri Dolgov joins John Collison to break down how they built the system behind it. From the sensor stack and why LiDAR still matters, to the role of simulation and critic models in training the AI.

[SPEAKER_03] They also get into why driver assist won't naturally evolve into full autonomy, what it takes to scale globally, and how the product itself is changing. From custom-built vehicles to entirely new economies of ride hailing.

[SPEAKER_01] Dmitri Dolgov is co-CEO of Waymo. He joined Google's self-driving car project in 2009 as one of its first engineers, and was repeatedly promoted until he took it over in 2021. Waymo is Google's most successful moonshot, and now provides over 500,000 fully autonomous rides each week. Cheers, by the way. Yeah, cheers.

[SPEAKER_02] You grew up in Russia, right? Yes, I grew up in Russia. Yeah. Then I... I was actually Soviet Union. Right, right, exactly. My dad is a physicist. Okay. So, you know, the Soviet Union started falling apart, and then he got... I had a position, a visiting position in university, in Kyoto University for a year. We moved there as a family, and then he went to Berkeley, and I kind of tagged along. And then I ran out of... You know, I graduated from high school. Yep.

[SPEAKER_02] I was thinking about the next thing I wanted to do, and I really liked that technical school in Russia. But the Russians are serious about the physics. They are, they are. So I went back to Russia, and I got my bachelor's and master's there.

[SPEAKER_01] What year was this that you went back to Russia? 1994. Okay. So that was kind of almost peak Russian optimism in a sense where... It was. It was opening up. It was, it was.

[SPEAKER_02] Yeah, yeah, no, actually I remember talking to my mom about it. And, you know, of course my parents grew up in the Soviet Union. They've seen it. Yeah. You know, they were born right before the war. And then they saw, you know, they lived through some really tough times. Yeah. And I remember talking to my mom and saying, she, she, you know, in fact, I got my ...

The System Behind Self-Driving: Waymo’s Dmitri Dolgov

Transcript

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The System Behind Self-Driving: Waymo’s Dmitri Dolgov

Transcript

Built for investment professionals

Every day you wait, your competitors are findingedge in conversations you're not hearing.

Every day you wait, your competitors are finding
edge in conversations you're not hearing.