AV group's top goal: Federal policy framework

WASHINGTON — Despite news last year of Cruise's robotaxis being investigated by NHTSA and the shuttering of Argo AI, the AV tech startup backed by Ford and Volkswagen, Jeff Farrah remains optimistic about the industry's future.

"Every industry has its growing pains as it grows up, and our industry isn't immune from that and isn't immune from the larger economic climate that's out there," said Farrah, the first executive director of the Autonomous Vehicle Industry Association, whose members include Aurora, Cruise, Ford, VW and Waymo.

Farrah — a Capitol Hill veteran who has spent time working as counsel to the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation — joined the association in October. Prior to this role, he was general counsel of the National Venture Capital Association.

"We're still thriving, and we're still making a lot of progress," he told Automotive News. "I think that's why you're seeing so many commercial partnerships popping up because a lot of entities are looking at AVs and saying, 'Gosh, this is a real solution to my problems.' "

Farrah, 41, spoke with Staff Reporter Audrey LaForest about the group's outlook for the year ahead. Here are edited excerpts.

Q: As the association's first executive director, what are your top priorities for 2023?

A: We need an industry association that reflects where we are as an industry itself, and there are a variety of things that are going to be happening in Washington and at state capitols and for city governments that we need to make sure the industry has a voice on.

We need a federal policy framework that really encourages the deployment and commercialization of AVs. The industry has done quite well from a technological perspective.

There's been a lot of progress that's been made in that regard, but we haven't made the same level of progress when it comes to federal legislation or federal policymaking.

We're going to be encouraging those agencies and those leaders up on Capitol Hill to make a lot of progress there in 2023, so that these signals are being sent to the industry that we want to be the global leader when it comes to AVs and that policymakers really have the back of the industry in making sure that we're able to deploy things as the industry really hopes to do.

The other goal that's very closely related is being a lot more proactive in terms of explaining to the American public a lot of the benefits that will accrue from AVs.

I think for a lot of Americans, they don't necessarily live in cities that have seen AV deployment, and so to them this is still a bit of a mystery, and they think that we're still in a situation where it's a science fiction project. We have an opportunity now to get out there and make sure that we're telling people our vision for the future.

Several federal legislative attempts previously have stalled. Is there hope for AV legislation in 2023?

We've been very fortunate to have champions on both sides of the aisle in both the House and the Senate, but a job for our industry is to really build that out and make sure that we're appealing to a much broader base of policymakers so that we can ultimately get AV legislation that does help with the deployment and commercialization of AVs. As gratifying as it is to have these bills introduced and having members of Congress be very interested in our space, we need to ultimately take that next step to doing something that really solves a lot of issues for the industry.

For most members of Congress, they really want to understand what this does for their constituents and how it is going to benefit their lives. This is really on us as an industry to be able to explain those things and talk about the safety benefits, mobility benefits, supply chain issues, environmental benefits and the need for American leadership on all of these issues.

U.S. Reps. Debbie Dingell and Bob Latta launched the bipartisan Congressional Autonomous Vehicle Caucus. How might that lay the groundwork for AV legislation?

From a staff member perspective on Capitol Hill, they're constantly inundated with people talking about various policy issues that are there, but a lot of times what they really want to know about is where the industry is from a technology and business perspective because things have shifted over time and what the industry's needs were even, say, two or three years ago at the beginning of the pandemic, they've changed in a lot of ways.

That's something where it was really great to level set with those staffers and explain to them where we are and where we're going as an industry.

In terms of moving legislation forward, this is a really core group and very important to us because these are members of Congress that have raised their hands and said, "I care about this issue. I think this is something that's going to be deeply impactful to the American public, and at a very minimum, I need to learn more about it, but also, I might want to help move the ball forward."

We intend to engage very deeply with the offices on the committee, and we'd love to see the group get built out even further because this is something where they're talking about what ultimately is going to become a massive industry that's going to be transformational in terms of transportation in this country.

We think this is something that every single member of the House of Representatives and the Senate is ultimately going to need to care about.

What's the biggest obstacle to achieving your group's goals?

You've got a tremendous amount of competition for the attention span of policymakers.

We are presently not an extremely large industry, and so we are one of many characters that are out there trying to make sure that we're pushing ahead, trying to get policies that are put in place to ultimately help deliver a lot of these benefits.

We need to find ways to break through and find ways to make sure that policymakers are paying attention in this space.

The good news is we have an incredible message, which is around the benefits, as it relates to safety, mobility and environmental issues and a lot of other things as well.

We're going to keep on talking about those things because what we do believe is that policymakers from [Transportation] Secretary [Pete] Buttigieg down to every single member of Congress, they care about those things, too.

They know that we cannot tolerate any longer the amount of deaths that we have on American roads and that there's a better way out there. We need to find a way to work together to push forward on that.