A demand from the California DMV of eight companies testing self-driving cars has highlighted a number of areas where the technology falls short of being safe to operate with no human backup.

On March 18, a robot-driven Volvo operated by Uber hit and killed a pedestrian in Arizona. Advocates for automation maintained that the tragedy shouldn’t detract from the likelihood that driverless technology is eliminating human error and making driving safer.

Uber Technologies Inc.’s settlement of Waymo’s trade-secrets lawsuit in February left a key piece unresolved: the role played by Anthony Levandowski, the engineer at the center of the alleged theft of critical self-driving technology.

Forget Uber, Waymo and Tesla: The next big name in self-driving vehicles could be the Pentagon.

South Korean electronics group LG aims to become the world leader in lighting self-driving cars, by taking over Austrian car lights specialist ZKW for an estimated $1.3 billion, LG announced April 26.

Tesla Inc.’s Autopilot chief, Jim Keller, has left the company, the latest in a rash of executive departures at the electric-car maker led by CEO Elon Musk.

Jaguar Land Rover, which is teaming with Waymo to develop autonomous vehicles, is testing the technology predominantly in the United Kingdom and sharpening efforts to make the roads safer with such cars, CEO Ralf Speth said.

On April 24, Yamato Transport Co. and DeNA Co. tested an autonomous vehicle delivery service to gauge the potential of self-driving technology in the field of logistics.

As the yellow and black bulldozer-like machine zoomed around the construction site preparing the ground for 700 new houses, all that was missing was someone in the driver’s seat.

UD Trucks, a Japanese subsidiary of Swedish truck maker Volvo AB, plans to introduce electric and autonomous trucks within the next two years, joining global rivals in developing driverless technologies to ease a labor shortage.