Driverless Features
News: Tesla Says New Autopilot Is Now as Good as Old One
Tesla says the new version of Autopilot is now as good as the previous one, after having completed over-the-air updates of the driverless software during the past few days.
News: Hella & ZF Want to Go Big Together in Cameras, Radar
German groups ZF Friedrichshafen AG and HELLA are collaborating to add to their autonomous portfolios with camera and radar development.
News: Head of FedEx Freight Wants Laws to Make Truck Drivers More Like Pilots
We've heard a lot about self-driving taxis, as car and ride-sharing companies compete to win the driverless gold rush. But FedEx wants to bring its enterprise into the mix, as the head of its freight division has asked the US government to develop laws for self-driving trucks.
News: Bosch to Use NVIDIA's New Xavier Chip to Help Automakers Reach Level 4
As Intel steps up their investment in driverless technology with a $15 billion acquisition of Mobileye, so have automotive supplier Bosch and NVIDIA teamed up to manufacturer driverless car systems with the much-awaited Xavier chip.
Today's Top News: CEO Arrested After Baidu Pulls Crazy Stunt to Show China's Still in the Driverless Race
China's Baidu, the Chinese equivalent of Google, live streamed a video yesterday of CEO Robin Li riding a self-drive vehicle along the streets and highways of Beijing.
News: The Audi A8 Is Smart Enough to Read & React to Signposts
The Audi A8 may be short on the wow factor as the industry's first Level 3 car, but Audi has revealed some interesting details about one stand-out feature underneath the hood: the car's ability to self-pilot itself at stop signs and lights.
News: Uber's Self-Driving Program Faces Potential Shutdown
Uber's chance at driverless domination may be ripped away as its legal battle with Waymo escalates. The company's self-driving program is now under threat of closure if the allegations of premeditated theft are proven
News: Former Google Self-Driving Car Boss Receives Funds for New Project
Google's former driverless car boss Chris Urmson raised considerable funds to get his new startup company Aurora Innovation up and running. Axios initially reported that Urmson raised over $3 million to fund his brainchild in the wake of his Alphabet exit, according to an SEC filing.
Today's Top News: Hyundai Rushes to Offer Level 2, but After GM Launch
Hyundai Motor Company says it will launch its driverless tech ahead of schedule, but the Korean carmaker will remain behind mainstream rivals, including General Motors (GM), Nissan, and Honda.
Today's Top News: Uber Demands to Know What Exactly Lyft & Waymo Are Doing
Waymo and Lyft have remained highly secretive about their driverless car programs, but may be forced to reveal a lot about their plans after a judge in a US federal court granted Uber's request to review documents about Waymo and Lyft's partnership.
News: Uber Engineer Accused of Data Theft Is Pleading the Fifth as Judge Demands Explanation
A federal judge wants answers after an Uber engineer accused of data theft pleaded the Fifth in the ongoing Waymo versus Uber battle. This privilege would protect the accused, Anthony Levandowski, of self-incrimination and handing over specific documents demanded in a previous subpoena and forthcoming deposition.
News: Silicon Valley Big Shots Courted by Ford & GM
The driverless competition is heating up as Detroit automakers attempt to woo tech talent away from some of Silicon Valley's biggest players.
News: A 22-Year-Old May Be About to Disrupt the Entire LiDAR Industry
Uber has been in the hot seat for awhile now, for many reasons, especially for being sued by Waymo over stolen LiDAR designs. But now, perhaps the attention will be taken off both Uber and Waymo as a new contender enters the LiDAR arena; A small, independent company called Luminar has finally let the world in on what it has been cooking up.
News: Australia Is Becoming a Hotbed for Autonomous Innovations
Australia is looking to the future and finding driverless cars and other autonomous vehicles to be a top priority. Spacial Source reports that the state government has put AU$10 million into their Future Mobility Land Fund "to drive local development of autonomous vehicle technology."
News: Velodyne Joins the Cheap Solid-State LiDAR Game with the Velarray Sensor
Velodyne wants to set the standard for the driverless industry when it comes to LiDAR. To do that, the Silicon Valley-based team just announced its next step — create a low-cost, fixed-laser sensor that can be embedded into a wide range of automotive and autonomous vehicles. That next step is named the Velarray. A sturdy, compact, and affordable LiDAR laser.
Today's Top News: Ex-Uber CEO Kalanick Is Not Coming Back — & That's Good for Driverless
Ex-Uber CEO and founder Travis Kalanick's bad and likely illegal behavior aside, his vision of not wanting to pay "the other dude in the car" has lead to a ground-breaking driverless test fleet.
News: Tesla Starts Massive Video Uploads from Cars for Machine Learning
Tesla has confirmed the EV carmaker has begun to upload videos from models equipped with its latest flavor of Autopilot, as Tesla seeks to "fleet source" data to help improve its cars' machine learning capabilities.
News: Waymo Patent Shows Plans to Replace Steering Wheel & Pedals with Push Buttons
Waymo just received approval on a patent for a push-button console that replaces not only a steering wheel in a car but the brake and gas pedals, too. This reflects Alphabet's driverless arm could remain true to its original mantra of developing cars that pilot themselves without human intervention.
News: Multi-Cores, AI & Computer Parallelism — How Gaming Chips Drive Cars
Long before Nvidia figured out how to embed neural networks in its graphics processor units (GPUs) for driverless vehicles, it and other chipmakers were already making the same kinds of devices for 3D games and other apps.
News: 4 New Updates to Tesla's Autopilot
It's been an exciting week for Tesla. First, Elon Musk offered a preview of the nearly complete Model 3, then China tech giant Tencent invested $1.78 billion in the company. Now, Tesla has officially updated its Autopilot software today for Tesla owners with Autopilot 2.0 hardware.
News: Quora's Director of Engineering Leaves to Head Deep Learning Driverless Startup Drive.ai
It may seem strange to find the director of engineering at a question-and-answer site all of a sudden pick up and lead a new driverless startup, but to Kah Seng Tay, both engineering tasks require building the right infrastructure to handle large amounts of AI data.
News: Waymo Kills Much-Hyped 'Fireflies' in Shift Away from Designing Own Cars
Waymo revealed more clues about its future business model after it said yesterday it plans to kill its Firefly pod-like car project and focus more closely on offering driverless systems for commercially available car and truck models.
News: Argo AI's First Driverless Car Is Spied in Pittsburgh
Argo AI is coming late to the party, but has begun testing a fleet of driverless cars in hopes of developing robo-taxi services to eventually compete against those that Waymo, Uber, Cruise Automation, and others plan to offer.
Today's Top News: BMW Slashes Combustion Engine Costs by 1 Billion Euros in Auto Industry Shift to Driverless & EVs
The auto industry continues to shift into high gear to lay the groundwork for driverless cars with an electric vehicle (EV) emphasis.
News: Waymo Accuses Uber of Withholding Secret LiDAR Device
The drama continues! In the latest installment of the feud that has rocked the driverless vehicle industry, Waymo is now accusing Uber of withholding a secret LiDAR device.
News: Toyota Puts Blockchain to the Test for Data Security
Toyota is testing blockchain and distributed ledger technology (BC/DL) for data sharing for driverless cars and other applications. This could eventually reassure buyers of its upcoming high-end cars by making sure their sensitive data is secure.
News: Boston Dynamics' Latest Nightmare Robot 'Handle' Is Humanoid with Wheels for Feet
Today, at Abundance 360, an exclusive event for tech entrepreneurs in Beverly Hills, California, Boston Dynamics unveiled a video of "Handle," a humanoid-like robot with wheels instead of feet.
Today's Top News: Tesla Quietly Upgrades Autopilot Hardware
Tesla CEO and founder Elon Musk has repeatedly said this year all Tesla models made since October 2016 have the requisite hardware for "full self-driving" capabilities, yet the company has reportedly begun to add a second graphics processor (GPU) to its computer platform for Autopilot — without officially saying why.
News: Udacity—The School for Robo-Cars—Just Spun-Off Its First Driverless Startup
Udacity, the online education startup that set out to train a school of self-driving car engineers, is now spinning off into its own autonomous tech company called Voyage.
Exclusive: Uber Driver Goes Full Driverless, Terrifying NYC Passenger
Well, well, well. Uber, we knew you were investing a ton of money into creating self-driving taxis and flying cars, but what we didn't know is that you were already testing out your driverless vehicles on the streets of New York City.
News: 'Google's' Self-Driving Car Just Graduated—Welcome to Waymo
Earlier today, Alphabet announced that the Self-Driving Car Project has officially graduated from their innovation factory (X) and will now operate as an independent company called Waymo.
News: Apple's Self-Driving Dream Team Revealed! Meet Ruslan Salakhutdinov & His Crew
Rumors that Apple is honing its automated car technology have skyrocketed. Thanks, now, in no small part to some enterprising members of the media who leaked the names of Apple's self-driving car team to the public.
Today's Top News: Drive.ai Startup Gets $50 Million, Waymo's Driverless Trucks Spied, GM CEO on Workplace Diversity
Drive.ai (a startup founded by Stanford University graduates), Waymo, General Motors, and serial entrepreneur and author Vivek Wadhwa are featured in today's top news.
Today's Top News: Tesla's Moment of Truth as Model 3 Arrives, Intel & Mobileye Double Down on Driverless
All eyes will be on Tesla CEO and founder Elon Musk tonight to see if he is reveals details about the status of Tesla's challenged Autopilot at tonight's official Model 3 launch party.
News: Check Out Volvo's Vision for a Driverless Garbage Truck Future
Volvo is joining the autonomous vehicle race. In a video released Tuesday, the company showed off its concept for a driverless garbage truck, adding themselves to a growing list of manufacturers pledging to work in the self-driving field.
Timeline: Uber's Terrible Year Just Keeps Getting Worse
Uber's driverless cabs began picking people up in Arizona in February, after its attempt at a pilot test in San Francisco. Now, one of these cars has been in an accident, and that's just the tip of the iceberg.
Today's Top News: Self-Touted 'Tesla of the Seas' Seeks Early Lead by Launching Pilotless Ship in 2018
A Norwegian carrier's launch of a pilotless container ship next year could lead the way to a new era in sea transportation and shipping if successful.
News: Otto Cofounder Claims Autonomous Trucks Will Be Taking Over Highways Within 10 Years
Any truck driver who breathed a sigh of relief when US Secretary of Commerce Steve Mnuchin recently stated that driverless cars "will not affect jobs in a meaningful way for roughly 50 to 100 years" can go back to being anxious about job security again.
News: Continental to Supply Driverless Tech to Startup NIO in China
Driverless partnerships continue to appear as Continental AG, leading German automotive manufacturing company, has signed a strategic cooperation agreement with global electric startup, NIO. The goal of this partnership is to research, share, and develop autonomous technology, among other developments.
News: Tata Elxsi Licenses Driverless Software to Top-Five Carmaker, Doesn't Say Which One
Global design and technology services company Tata Elxsi says it has licensed its advanced autonomous vehicle middleware platform "AUTONOMAI" to a "leading automotive OEM."