autonomous - SlashGear

Waymo’s self-driving Safety Report is all about reassuring passengers

Chris Davies | Oct 12, 2017

Waymo, the Alphabet business working on autonomous cars, has released its first safety report, a recap of 3.5m miles of on-road activity. Intended to reassure potential passengers - and wary regulators - that self-driving vehicles are "safer by design," the report covers everything from incidents through to backup systems. It also digs into what sort of interactions with a driverless vehicle passengers might expect.

California is removing its most controversial driverless car rule

Chris Davies | Oct 11, 2017

Autonomous cars in California may do away with the human backup driver behind the wheel, with newly proposed regulations amending one of the most controversial aspects of the current rules. The California DMV had opened up its regulations for driverless testing and deployment regulations earlier this year for public input, releasing a new version today that includes significant changes to what companies working on self-driving cars are required to do should human intervention be demanded.

NVIDIA’s new Pegasus wants the keys to your Level 5 autonomous car

Eric Abent | Oct 10, 2017

Though development on self-driving vehicles seems to be proceeding nicely at a number of different companies, the end goal of creating level 5 autonomous vehicles is still quite a ways off. Prototypes for cars that feature level 5 autonomy already exist, but the amount of computing power those cars need to carry out their tasks is immense, resulting in heavy, power hungry systems. NVIDIA wants to help with that, introducing its third-generation Drive PX platform at GTC Europe 2017 today.

Voyage rolls out first driverless car at retirement community

Shane McGlaun | Oct 5, 2017

Voyage is a company that wants to bring driverless, fully autonomous taxis to market that will be "extremely affordable" to hail. In a big step towards making that goal a reality, Voyage has rolled out its first self-driving taxis at The Villages retirement community in San Jose, CA. The large community has over 4,000 residents living there.

Toyota’s new driverless prototype has a surprise inside

Chris Davies | Sep 27, 2017

Most driverless cars are aiming to do away with physical controls, which makes the fact that Toyota's latest autonomous vehicle has two sets all the more unexpected. The Toyota Research Institute (TRI)'s Platform 2.1 research vehicle gives March's big 2.0 update a sensor update, throwing in a new LIDAR laser scanning system. Arguably more important, however, is how the prototype melds different levels of driver-assistance together.

Ford and Lyft team on autonomous cars with the goal of going mainstream

Shane McGlaun | Sep 27, 2017

Ford and Lyft have announced that they have teamed up to bring autonomous cars into the mainstream. Ford says that its tie up with Lyft is a significant step in bringing self-driving cars to the masses. The goal of the partnership is to bring affordable, dependable, and accessible transportation to the future.

This 3D printed sensor could democratize self-driving cars

Chris Davies | Sep 22, 2017

An innovative 3D-printed sensor could dramatically reduce the cost of giving autonomous cars a 360-degree view of the world, potentially replacing radar as a key component of driverless technology. The tech, handiwork of researchers at the University of Arizona, is currently being developed for commercialization by startup Lunewave. That's making some big claims about just how much of an improvement over the traditional sensing suite its spherical sensors might be.

Matternet Station supports fully automated battery and package exchange for drone networks

Shane McGlaun | Sep 20, 2017

Matternet is a developer of one an autonomous drone logistics platform. This is a platform where people can use drones to deliver items over shorter distances. Matternet has unveiled a new Matternet Station platform that enables fully automated ground operations for Matternet customers.

Udacity and Lyft team over new self-driving nanodegree program

Brittany A. Roston | Sep 19, 2017

Udacity has announced a new 'nanodegree' program that revolves around self-driving cars, and it is available to anyone who signs up (and pays the fee, of course). The program is designed to help kick off a career in self-driving automotive technologies, though it is an introductory course and not something you're likely to get a job solely with. The course opens early next month and lasts for four months, about the length of a typical semester.

Intel and Waymo just made a self-driving car behemoth

Eric Abent | Sep 18, 2017

Waymo just gained itself a pretty big companion in its quest to tackle autonomous vehicles. Today Intel announced that it will be joining Waymo in developing technologies for self-driving cars. Specifically, Intel believes it can provide Waymo with the processing power it needs to create level 4 and level 5 autonomous vehicles.

Renault SYMBIOZ is a house and a car that work in harmony

Shane McGlaun | Sep 18, 2017

People who drive a lot for work tend to feel like they live in their cars, but Renault has a new concept called SYMBIOZ that is an integrated house and car designed to work together in harmony. The concept is a vision of an autonomous car and connected home that sees the car in use in different places within and around the home.

Samsung’s new $300m self-driving fund is already splashing cash

Chris Davies | Sep 14, 2017

Samsung has opened up a $300m fund for autonomous vehicle tech, aiming to splash some cash at projects aiming to help cut human drivers out of the equation. Dubbed the Samsung Automotive Innovation Fund, it'll focus not only on fully driverless systems but advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) too. Samsung says potential beneficiaries are teams working on machine vision, AI, and smart sensors.