Why Waymo’s Hardware Decision Matters to Your Business

You do not need to build a robotaxi to face the same basic business problem as Waymo: your operations produce more information than your team can process quickly and consistently.

Customer enquiries arrive through WhatsApp, email, social media and phone calls. Sales orders sit in spreadsheets or chat threads. Delivery updates, stock movements and payment records keep changing. As your business grows, the challenge is not simply collecting data. It is responding to useful information at the right moment.

Waymo’s latest self-driving system shows how a growing technology company is dealing with that challenge. Instead of relying only on general-purpose components, it designed a custom chip to process data from its autonomous vehicle. The lesson for you is not to buy specialised hardware. It is to examine whether your business systems are handling important information efficiently.

TL;DR: Waymo built a custom 5-nanometre chip that processes data before it reaches the main computing system. Its vehicle uses 13 high-fidelity cameras and the chip provides more than 1,000 TOPS of computing performance, according to TechCrunch.

For a Malaysian SME, the practical takeaway is simpler: identify repetitive information-heavy work, connect your systems and automate the decisions that need speed, consistency and traceability.

What This Means

A custom chip, or application-specific integrated circuit, is designed for a particular type of work. In Waymo’s case, the chip handles a large volume of raw sensor information before that information reaches the central self-driving system. This can help the vehicle react quickly while reducing unnecessary processing.

The vehicle described in the source article has 13 high-fidelity cameras. Waymo says its chip delivers more than 1,000 trillion operations per second, a measure commonly called TOPS. That processing capability is intended to support fast and safe reactions in busy urban environments. The company also works with partners including AMD, Micron, Nvidia, Samsung, Sandisk, Socionext and TSMC, as reported by TechCrunch.

For you, “custom processing” can mean something much less technical. It could be a workflow that automatically reads an order, checks stock, assigns a delivery route, updates your customer and records the transaction. The important point is that information is filtered and acted on close to where the work happens, rather than being copied manually between several disconnected tools.

The useful lesson is not “build your own chip.” It is “design your operations around the work that matters most.”

How This Applies to Malaysian SMEs

1. Retail and e-commerce businesses. If you sell through a physical shop, website and marketplaces, you may be managing several versions of the same information. A customer places an order on one channel, but your team checks another system for stock. Someone then updates a spreadsheet and sends a delivery message manually. This creates delays and increases the chance of overselling or missing an order.

You can apply Waymo’s principle by creating a central order workflow. New orders should be captured automatically, checked against current stock and routed to the correct fulfilment person. When an item is packed, the status should update automatically. When it is handed to a courier, the customer should receive a consistent notification. The objective is to process high-volume routine information before it becomes a staff member’s manual task.

2. Service companies and contractors. For air-conditioning providers, renovation firms, cleaning companies, repair businesses and other field-service operators, the information flow is often spread across WhatsApp messages, phone calls and paper forms. A customer describes a problem, an administrator assigns a technician, the technician submits findings and someone prepares a quotation.

A connected workflow can capture the customer’s address, service type, preferred appointment time and job history in one record. It can then alert the right technician, provide a checklist and request photos or completion notes. This is similar to Waymo processing sensor information before making a driving decision: your business processes the relevant details before assigning work or communicating with the customer.

3. Wholesale, distribution and food businesses. Distributors and food operators need timely information about stock levels, purchase orders, delivery schedules and expiry dates. A delay in one area can affect the entire chain. If your sales team cannot see updated inventory, they may promise products that are unavailable. If warehouse staff do not receive clear picking instructions, deliveries may leave incomplete.

You can start by setting rules for stock alerts, reorder requests and delivery exceptions. For example, a low-stock notification can go to the person responsible for purchasing, while a delayed delivery can trigger an internal alert and a customer update. The system should not replace your judgement. It should make sure important events reach you before they become urgent problems.

4. Professional firms. Accountants, agencies, consultants and training providers also deal with information-heavy operations. Leads arrive through multiple channels, documents require review, appointments need confirmation and follow-ups are easily forgotten. A simple customer relationship workflow can record every enquiry, assign an owner and remind staff when an action is due.

This is particularly useful when one employee is away or when a customer speaks to different members of your team. A shared process makes the service less dependent on memory and individual chat histories.

Where to Begin: A Practical Data Flow

Business activity	Information to capture	Useful automated action
New customer enquiry	Name, contact, request and source	Assign follow-up and send acknowledgement
New order	Items, quantity, delivery details and status	Check stock and create fulfilment task
Service booking	Location, job type and preferred timing	Assign staff and send appointment reminder
Payment follow-up	Invoice status and due date	Notify responsible staff and send approved reminder
Delivery exception	Order, courier update and customer contact	Escalate internally and update customer

These are workflow examples rather than fixed rules. You should adapt them to your approval process, customer expectations and industry requirements. The first goal is visibility: everyone should know what happened, what must happen next and who owns the task.

Practical Takeaways

• List the five business processes that create the most repetitive data entry.
• Mark where information is copied from WhatsApp, email or paper into another system.
• Choose one process with clear inputs and outputs, such as enquiry follow-up or order fulfilment.
• Create a single record for each customer, order, job or invoice.
• Set automatic alerts for exceptions, not every minor activity.
• Use approval steps where a human decision is important.
• Keep an audit trail showing who changed a status and when.
• Review access permissions so staff see the information needed for their role.
• Test the workflow with real examples before making it standard practice.
• Measure response time, missed follow-ups and incomplete records after implementation.

What You Should Not Copy Blindly

Waymo’s approach involves advanced engineering, specialist partners and a safety-critical environment. Your SME should not automate a process simply because automation sounds impressive. A poorly designed workflow can spread incorrect information faster than a manual process.

Begin with stable, repeatable work. Do not automate a complex approval process until you understand the decisions involved. Keep people responsible for unusual cases, sensitive customer requests and operational exceptions. Automation should reduce avoidable administration while keeping accountability clear.

You should also treat data quality as part of the project. If customer phone numbers, item codes or staff assignments are inconsistent, the workflow will produce unreliable results. Before connecting systems, agree on basic naming rules and decide which system is the source of truth for each type of information.

The Bigger Picture

Waymo’s custom chip reflects a wider direction in business technology: companies are bringing processing closer to the point where information is created. In a vehicle, that may mean handling sensor data inside the car. In your business, it may mean an order workflow that checks information immediately instead of waiting for someone to reconcile it later.

As tools become easier to connect, SMEs will compete less on who can collect the most data and more on who can turn reliable information into consistent action. A small business with a clear workflow can respond faster, maintain better records and operate with less dependence on one employee’s memory.

The long-term advantage is operational discipline. When your team knows where information goes, which actions happen automatically and when a human must intervene, growth becomes easier to manage. You do not need Waymo’s technology stack. You need a practical system designed around your customers, your staff and the decisions that keep your business moving.

For Malaysian SME owners, the starting point is straightforward: choose one information-heavy process, remove unnecessary handoffs and make the next action visible to the right person.

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