Uber took a defiant stance on its self-driving cars in California. The authorities have asked the company to halt its operations until it receives an appropriate license from the California DMV. However, now it has emerged that the company was aware of the technological glitches which made these cars a potential risk to bikes on the road.

It has been observed that Uber's modified Volvo XC90 SUVs has issues with making right-hook-style turns when there is a bike lane. The cars seem to cut into the bike lane at the last moment before making their turn. This is in contravention of the state law which requires cars first to merge into the bike lane, well in advance of the approaching turn.

The issue has been raised by the SF Bicycle Coalition, which claimed that the car company was notified about the flaw in is software before the cars were plied on San Francisco roads. Uber responded saying that it has not modified the rules to change the way these cars deal with right hook turns. However, it admitted that human intervention is required for such maneuvers.

This concern adds to a list of challenges Uber needs to be addressed before its self-driving cars become mainstream. The company is looking to make a distinction between autonomous vehicles and self-driving cars. Uber states that its prototypes fall under the self-driving vehicle category. It claimed that its cars are to closer to Autopilot mode Teslas than to the Google car.

"It's hard to understand why the DMV would seek to require self-driving Ubers to get permits when it accepts that Tesla's Autopilot technology does not need them," Anthony Levandowski, head of the Advanced Technology Group with Uber, said.