Employment expansion

West Coast tech company revs up Austin workforce with 130 new jobs

Austin aerial skyline with bridges and Lady Bird Lake

The California company is expanding its presence in Austin.

Ryan Conine/Getty Images

Rev.com, a provider of artificial-intelligence-powered, voice-to-text transcription services, is revving up its presence in Austin.

Opportunity Austin, an economic growth initiative of the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce, announced March 24 that Rev.com is expanding its Austin workforce with the addition of 130 employees by the end of this year. The company currently employs 130 people in Austin. Departments where Rev.com is hiring include engineering, product, marketing, and sales.

San Francisco-based Rev.com occupies more than 14,000 square feet of office space at Hartland Plaza, which is at West Sixth Street and MoPac Expressway.

“As the number one speech-to-text service in the world, Rev is a part of a growing technology sector in Austin featuring companies with innovative leaders working with AI to find solutions for businesses and individuals alike,” Charisse Bodisch, senior vice president of economic development at the Austin chamber, says in a news release.

Austin serves as Rev.com’s second headquarters, and the company’s CEO points to Austin’s quality of life and spirit of innovation as key reasons it originally chose the city and continues to seek growth here. Since the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the company has added 61 workers in Austin and has leased an additional 1,641 square feet of office space to accommodate them.

“Being able to continue to grow even amidst a pandemic is a testament to Austin’s spirit of innovation and entrepreneurship,” Rev.com CEO Jason Chicola says.

technology

Self-driving Roller Coaster

More self-driving cars expected to roll out in Austin for 2025

Photo courtesy of Waymo via KVUE

Various brands offering self-driving cars are on-and-off in Austin.

Expect to see more self-driving rideshare vehicles, also known as robotaxis, on Austin roads next year.

Robotaxi company Waymo, which you may have already seen on Austin's roads, is partnering with Uber. At some point next year, customers will be able to use the Uber app to call a self-driving ride.

Austin-based company Avride is in the testing phase and plans to roll out its robotaxis next year.

Currently, Volkswagen ADMT and Amazon's Zoox are in the testing phase in Austin, while Hyundai's Motional is in the mapping phase.

Last year, robotaxi company Cruise paused operations in Austin after the California Department of Motor Vehicles revoked the company's permits to operate driverless vehicles in the state. And last week, General Motors said it would no longer fund the company because of the time and resources needed.

This way of getting around has come with its safety concerns and issues. The city is tracking those concerns. According to the Transportation Department, the problems span from blocking the roads and parking in front of people's homes for weeks with lights beaming through their windows, to actual wrecks.

Since July 2023, robotaxis have been involved in 75 incidents. Only 21 of those incidents happened in 2024. It's important to note that Cruise has not been operating in Austin this year.

Since July 2023, driverless rideshare vehicles have been involved in 22 near collisions, eight collisions and seven instances where driverless taxis ignored directions from the Austin Police Department (APD).

According to the data, at least four of those Austin police incidents happened in recent months. The issues varied from driving through police checkpoints, to malfunctioning and getting stuck at an APD road closure near pedestrians, causing safety concerns.

A Waymo spokesperson said their vehicles have gesture recognition capabilities, which they've been training APD officers on using.

As the report shows, sometimes it does not work and Waymo said it is working to improve that. The spokesperson said that as of just last week, Waymo's First Responder Program has been independently verified by TÜV SÜD, making Waymo the first autonomous vehicle (AV) company to receive third-party validation for our emergency response protocols. They also said the data to date indicates the Waymo Driver is already reducing traffic injuries and fatalities in the places where the company currently operates.

Read the full story and watch the video at KVUE.com.

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