The project gets its own brand under the Alphabet umbrella.

The Google self-driving car is no more. As of today, the autonomous vehicle project takes its own place under the Alphabet corporate hierarchy and will be known as Waymo.

Earlier in the day, rumors circulated that Alphabet was pulling the plug on the entire self-driving project, preferring instead to partner with other OEMs. It's true that the program has been troubled of late, but spinning the company out on its own seems more of a vote of confidence than handing everyone involved a pink slip. Still, there are some—like Elon Musk—who believe that Google's 2 million autonomously driven miles aren't sufficient and that companies like Tesla or Uber have now eclipsed one of the early pioneers in the field.

In common with just about everyone else working on a self-driving car, Waymo will be all about mobility. Or, in its own words, "Waymo is a self-driving technology company with a mission to make it safe and easy for people and things to move around." In a Medium post announcing the new company, Waymo's CEO John Krafcik highlighted the potential that self-driving vehicles have for cutting the number of road deaths and empowering those who until now have been left behind by the automobile.