The future of driving and car ownership is anything but certain, leading established automakers to explore new bets and business models. Ford, for example purchased San Francisco-based shuttle service Chariot last month, and General Motors invested $500 million in Uber competitor Lyft this year with plans for autonomous cars down the proverbial road. Further, GM announced it would be making some of its cars available as rentals to would-be Lyft drivers in March through a program called Express Drive. Meanwhile Maven, a GM program that TechCrunch first broke news of in January, an hourly rental car service styled along the lines of ride-hailing apps and targeted at the Zipcar and Getaround market.

That service provides GM vehicles at rates of $8 an hour, gas included (similar to what Zipcar's original pricing was when they launched here a decade ago), and has so far been available in Ann Arbor, Chicago, New York, and nine other markets. Now Venturebeat reports that Maven will make San Francisco its tenth market, and Buzzfeed writes that the car company hopes Maven will blend right in here in the Bay Area.

Maven requires users to register before they begin to use the app, which allows them to reserve one of 60 vehicles. Those are available for pick-up and drop-off at locations including the Financial District, the Embarcadero, SoMa, an the Mission. Just approach the vehicle, unlock it with the app on your phone, and then, when you're finished, bring it back and hit "end" in the app.

In terms of price, Maven compares favorably toto Zipcar, it appears, with Zipcar's hourly rates starting near $12. City CarShare, however, features cheaper rates: $5.75 per mile, gas also included. Likely Maven's cars are newer, and GM is hyping their connective capabilities, such as Apple CarPlay, Android Auto, et al. In taking them out for a drive, of course, Maven users are being marketed GM vehicles in a new spin on the test-drive experience. But Venturebeat has some questions about how Maven might fare in a city where similar services like Car2Go have "encountered resistance cracking the market," so we'll have to see.

"When I joined GM a year ago, it was a company that just sold cars,” chief operating officer of Maven Dan Grossman tells BuzFeed. “What are other mechanisms to produce revenue? GM could either … spend all this money in marketing to convince people to keep buying our cars, or they could take money and invest. When GM sells a car, it produces revenue. When somebody rents a car, it produces revenue.”

Indeed, as GM President Dan Amman said to BuzzFeed in April, "the whole foundation of how your business has operated for the last 100 years is up for discussion.” Well? Discuss!

Related: Ford Is Buying SF-Based Shuttle Service Chariot; Also They're Taking Over Bay Area Bike Share