BMW, Intel and Mobileye to begin self-driving car tests on public roads later this year

[Jos]

Car makers and several tech firms are racing to develop autonomous driving technologies, which are widely expected to shape the future of private and public transportation. Back in June last year BMW, Intel and machine-vision technology company Mobileye announced a joint project to deliver a flagship BMW self driving car by 2021, and now they’re sharing a little bit more on their roadmap.

Yesterday at CES the group revealed plans to deploy about 40 modified BMW 7 Series sedans for testing on public roads in the U.S. and Europe by the second half of 2017. The goal is to apply the gathered data not only toward producing BMW’s self-driving vehicle — codenamed iNext — four years from now, but to develop “scalable architecture” that can be adopted by other vehicle brands as a turnkey option instead of creating all of their own autonomous driving technology from scratch.

Intel is separately working on another partnership with Mobileye and Delphi centered on self-driving technology, with the goal of delivering a fully functioning system by 2019. This is not tied to a particular car manufacturer but rather to developing an autonomous-car system that can then be sold to automakers.

The company also created a new business unit known as the Automated Driving Group and has vowed to spend $250 million over the next two years toward the development of autonomous vehicles.

BMW, Intel, and Mobileye will have plenty of company in the self-driving market with the likes of Uber, Ford and Volkswagen — among others — also pursuing their own self-driving projects. 

Meanwhile, Google has spun off its self-driving car project into a new venture called Waymo with a view to eventually using the self driving technology in consumer vehicles as well as ridesharing, logistics and in last-mile situations. They recently signed a deal with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV to incorporate its technology into 100 Chrysler Pacifica plug-in hybrid minivans, which should hit public roads for testing sometime in 2017, and are also in talks with Honda for a technical collaboration along the same lines.

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[Bigtruckseries]

Insurance companies and police are never going to allow automated cars to drive without drivers behind the wheel. "Automated driving" will be nothing more than an advanced cruise control, unless a special insurance company comes along (or special fee comes along) that pools the risk of automated cars injuring or killing someone/ or damaging property.

You will probably never reach a point where you can get in the backseat of a car - drunk - and tell it to "take me home".

Although I'd love to see people be able to have cars drive them where they need to go, or be able to send cars to pick up loved ones, or be able to let a car park itself after dropping you off... the law demands a human be in control of the vehicle at any given time - just in case the unthinkable happens.

Here's my question:

If the police want to stop an automated car, how exactly do they?

They'd need a kill switch of some type.

If they have remote access to a car, so would "others".

It's actually fun to think about the consequences of automated driving. It reminds me of the absurdity of people worrying about blind people cooking in a pitch black dark kitchen.

 

[rvnwlfdroid]

Insurance companies and police are never going to allow automated cars to drive without drivers behind the wheel. "Automated driving" will be nothing more than an advanced cruise control, unless a special insurance company comes along (or special fee comes along) that pools the risk of automated cars injuring or killing someone/ or damaging property.

You will probably never reach a point where you can get in the backseat of a car - drunk - and tell it to "take me home".

Although I'd love to see people be able to have cars drive them where they need to go, or be able to send cars to pick up loved ones, or be able to let a car park itself after dropping you off... the law demands a human be in control of the vehicle at any given time - just in case the unthinkable happens.

Here's my question:

If the police want to stop an automated car, how exactly do they?

They'd need a kill switch of some type.

If they have remote access to a car, so would "others".

It's actually fun to think about the consequences of automated driving. It reminds me of the absurdity of people worrying about blind people cooking in a pitch black dark kitchen.

I guess my first question would be what would a autonomous car be doing that a cop would need to pull it over. The second one is I'm sure when it starts to become main stream there will things in place so the vehicle will pull over when it sees a certain series of lights/signal being emitted. Whether it's to let an emergency vehicle pass or to be pulled over for what ever their reasoning. I myself am more excited about the variety of Driving assist tech that's being put into vehicles.

 

[gollum21]

I guess my first question would be what would a autonomous car be doing that a cop would need to pull it over. The second one is I'm sure when it starts to become main stream there will things in place so the vehicle will pull over when it sees a certain series of lights/signal being emitted. Whether it's to let an emergency vehicle pass or to be pulled over for what ever their reasoning. I myself am more excited about the variety of Driving assist tech that's being put into vehicles.

An autonomous car can easily still have reasons to get pulled over. A brake light going out is one. What if you yourself are having an emergency and don't have the time to be pulled over? (Yes, this is rare, but does happen). Will an autonomous car have a remote killswitch from law enforcement that can be manually over-ridden? Or will you be forced to pull over anyways?

Also, if lights are all it takes to get these cars to behave in a specific way, then what a time it will be to be a bored teenager with nothing better to do.