Forget autonomous vehicles. The term of the day is Artificial Intelligence (AI) self-driving vehicle and has been introduced by automotive corporation Continental when announcing its new partnership with tech giant NVIDIA. The goal of the partnership is the creation of Level 5 self-driving cars with no steering wheel or pedals.
The partnership announced on Monday will be based on the NVIDIA DRIVE platform. The target was set that by 2021 the first Level 3 cars powered by the companies' technology to become available to the public.
NVIDIA's DRIVE will be paired with Continental's driver assistance systems and sensors to develop highly automated driving features, including 360-degree perception and automatic lane changing on highways, as well as the ability to merge in traffic.
The end goal, the Level 5 autonomous vehicle, will see the driver becomes a mere passenger in a driverless taxi, with no possibility of controlling the car. When available, the system will have the highest rating level in safety.
“We now have all the key elements in place to take AI self-driving cars from development to mass production,” said Jensen Huang, CEO of NVIDIA.
“Our newly arrived DRIVE Xavier processor, extensive NVIDIA DRIVE software, and cloud-to-car approach for testing, validation, and functional safety, combined with Continental’s expertise and global reach, will bring autonomous cars to the world.”
The cars currently on the market are Level 2, 3 at most. Several manufacturers have begun testing Level 4 technologies. Since reaching Level 5 requires much more data, we are likely to see more and more research being conducted into this field by companies that are not traditionally linked with the automotive industry.
For now, most progress has been made by Ford, General Motors, and the Renault Nissan Alliance, as well as Google, Apple or Uber.
NVIDIA also partners with Uber and Volkswagen for the development of autonomous cars.
NVIDIA's DRIVE will be paired with Continental's driver assistance systems and sensors to develop highly automated driving features, including 360-degree perception and automatic lane changing on highways, as well as the ability to merge in traffic.
The end goal, the Level 5 autonomous vehicle, will see the driver becomes a mere passenger in a driverless taxi, with no possibility of controlling the car. When available, the system will have the highest rating level in safety.
“We now have all the key elements in place to take AI self-driving cars from development to mass production,” said Jensen Huang, CEO of NVIDIA.
“Our newly arrived DRIVE Xavier processor, extensive NVIDIA DRIVE software, and cloud-to-car approach for testing, validation, and functional safety, combined with Continental’s expertise and global reach, will bring autonomous cars to the world.”
The cars currently on the market are Level 2, 3 at most. Several manufacturers have begun testing Level 4 technologies. Since reaching Level 5 requires much more data, we are likely to see more and more research being conducted into this field by companies that are not traditionally linked with the automotive industry.
For now, most progress has been made by Ford, General Motors, and the Renault Nissan Alliance, as well as Google, Apple or Uber.
NVIDIA also partners with Uber and Volkswagen for the development of autonomous cars.