The Swedish Transport Agency recently granted the Swedish auto giant permission to begin real-world testing of its self-driving cars, boosting the company’s chances of meeting its stated goal of bringing the technology to market by 2021.

The self-driving cars will be allowed on motorways and streets in the Gothenburg area. The cars will not be allowed to exceed 60 kilometres per hour when the self-driving features are activated and drivers are required to keep at least one hand on the wheel at all times. Operators of the autonomous vehicles must also undergo training provided by Volvo.

Earlier this month, the Swedish company unveiled the futuristic concept car Volvo 360c, a fully autonomous, electric vehicle with no steering wheel that has been described as “a bedroom on wheels”, by a recent article on Verge.

The company will explore how autonomous vehicles can be used to shuttle people between cities, allowing them more time for rest, work and play instead of the hassle of flying. Air travel routes of around 300 kilometers (186 miles) are “prime candidates for disruption,” the company said. Such routes actually become more time-consuming by air than by car once you factor in travelling to and from the airport, going through security and boarding procedures. So, it would make sense to travel in a self-driven car that allows you to enjoy work and play, with premium comfort so that you wake up refreshed at your destination.

“The business will change in the coming years and Volvo should lead that change of our industry,” company president and CEO Håkan Samuelsson said in a press release announcing the 360c. “Autonomous drive will allow us to take the big next step in safety but also open up exciting new business models and allow consumers to spend time in the car doing what they want to do.”

Volvo concludes that the 360c is a mere starter for a conversation about the doors that autonomous driving might open up in the future. The company intends to advance that conversation as technology and infrastructure continue to evolve.

While this is definitely a great conversation starter, we can’t be sure if autonomous cars can actually completely replace flights. Moreover, with the advent of hyperloop and flying cars, the competition is quite tough. What would you choose?

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The automobile industry has largely been driven by the legacy players and it was hard to imagine the words “automobile” and “startup” used together until a while back. Now however, things are changing as new trends emerge and automobile industry shifts towards mobility industry. Many tech startups are driving the new trends that we see including autonomy in cars. If you are interested in a driverless future, here are some startups you should keep a track on.

(Image: Nissan by cwkarl/CC BY-ND 2.0)

1- NuTonomy

NuTonomy was founded by MIT PhD graduates Karl Lagnemma and Emilio Frazzoli in 2013. While some startups and corporations are focusing on building technologies for future cars, they are working on retrofitting existing vehicles to make them driverless. The company is testing a fleet of self driving taxis which they expect to deploy in Singapore by 2018. NuTonomy cars are also being tested in other parts of the world with JLR.

Website

2- Nauto

Palo Alto based Nauto was founded by Stefan Heck and Fredrick Soo in 2015. Instead of relying on LiDar sensors being currently used by the likes of Google and others, Nauto uses pro-sumer cameras along with already existing tech like motion sensors, GPS and few other sensors. Merging dashcam info with AI, the system detects what is happening in front and helps the driver avoid dangerous situations. This isn’t exactly driverless at this point but by increasing the level of autonomy, it will accelerate the shift.

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3- Drive.ai

Silicon valley startup that has been working quietly under the wraps for quite a while got permissions to test on public roads in California earlier this year. Founded by Sameep Tandon and Carol Reiley, the startup is working on applying deep learning techniques to driverless cars. The company claims that the system will be better for extreme conditions when driving situations are far from ideal.

Website

4- Cruise automation

This Silicon Valley startup was in news recently for being acquired by General Motors. The startup launched in 2013 with semi-automatic conversion systems for vehicles and has developed algorithms that allow the vehicle to be more aware of road and surroundings. The startup has full fledged driverless systems and the association with GM will allow it to reach the goals quickly.

Website

5- Oxbotica

Oxbotica is a spin out company from the University of Oxford. The system developed by them, called Selenium can pull data from various systems and then use a series of algorithms to determine the position, surrounding conditions and possible route. The software learns as the vehicle is driven around and then can offer autonomy. They plan to develop software for not just autonomous cars but warehouse robots, forklifts and public transport vehicles.

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6- Comma ai

George Hotz took up the job of bringing self driving technology to masses at very low prices and started Comma.ai. Hotz termed Mobileye “behind the times” as he believed the same can be achieved at lower costs and promised aftermarket self driving kits for less than USD 1000. The company recently released data of its car driving on public roads and to keep development costs down, they are inviting people to share their driving data through a dashcam app.

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7- Otto

Launched by a group of former senior Google employees, including one from Google’s autonomous car project, Otto aims to make trucks driverless. This will make trucks more efficient as they can be used for longer part of their life and just like the promise driverless cars bring, driverless trucks will make roads safer.

Website

Also read: 9 industries that will be affected by the arrival of driverless cars

The post Interested in a driverless future? 7 startups that you should be watching appeared first on TravHQ.

The inevitable has happened. Everyone associated with driverless cars feared that the incident involving Tesla Model S will hurt sentiments around autonomous vehicles and put the regulating authorities on the defensive. As a result, Chinese officials have asked automobile manufacturers to stop testing driverless cars on Chinese highways until proper regulations are in place.

According to the head of Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, She Weizhen, they have a preliminary draft of the regulations that will be implemented. However, a timeline of when the guidelines will be released and implemented hasn’t been shared.

Until a while back, China has been pushing for driverless cars urging automobile manufacturers to adopt new technologies and work towards bringing new innovations in mobility space. However, now they are trying to strike a balance between public safety and innovation in auto industry.

In China, Baidu has been actively involved with driverless cars and LeEco also recently showcased its Tesla rivalling product. With this new announcement, the developments in this space will slow down. The Tesla Model S incident is still being investigated thoroughly and its legal consequences could significantly impact how automakers all over the world go on about autonomous vehicles. They might face an increased political pressure with tough regulations putting the developments on a slower pace.

However we are optimistic as the reports suggest that as the draft of rules is ready, they will be finalised soon and the manufacturers will be able to resume testing once they are in place.

Source: engadget

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For the past few days, the news of a Tesla Model S driver suffering a fatal crash has been doing rounds of the internet. It is a tragic loss indeed but it also puts light on some of the questions that are unanswered in the race for driverless cars. There is no denying the fact that autonomous vehicles can have significant impact on travel and other industries and they hold potential to significantly change ground transportation. However, the big question is if this incident would hurt the sentiments around this upcoming breed of vehicles and slow down the progress.

Tesla took its time, with the accident occurring on May 7 while the news came out only recently. The Model S in Autopilot failed to identify a white trailer against the bright sky and crashed without any attempt to slow down. There have been incidents in the past involving Tesla’s Autopilot however Tesla has always highlighted that it is a beta feature which is why there is a certain set of warnings and limitations associated with it. It is getting better but still requires attention from the driver.

There has been mixed response to the news of driverless cars in the past. The masses have been both against and in favour of this upcoming trend however this incident could make people sceptical. An incident was inevitable however it also sends the message that technology isn’t perfect and the users need to be more responsible. However, this could be an unfortunate sequence of less likely events and the potential of autonomous vehicles to make travel safer and faster can’t be dismissed at all.

A recent announcement by BMW could offer a solution. The major tech companies and automakers are working on their variants of driverless cars. BMW recently announced a new partnership with Intel and Mobileye to develop a new technology with the objective of putting driverless cars on roads by 2021. According to the three companies, their new platform would be made available to multiple manufacturers and join the alliance. They are trying to create common technology standards that would help multiple manufacturers update the vehicles faster and leverage the learning from any incidents or setbacks. According to Intel chief executive Brian Krzanich, this will be critical for advancing the safety aspects.

However the recent incidence could also result in an increased political pressure to tighten regulation thereby slowing down the developments in this space. The legal consequences of this incident could also have a significant impact on how the tech and auto companies go on about autonomous vehicles in future. The liability in such an incident has been a topic of discussion for a while and it is unclear how this one will be handled. The beta helped Tesla generate meaningful data about road conditions and driving patterns just like any other beta test run by tech companies. However, this incident will force regulators to rethink if partial automation has got major risks.

It is certain that full automation in vehicles will revolutionize things and make transport safer. However it is still long way off and might require to leaders to join hands for good.

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