GM sues Ford over hands-free branding
General Motors is suing rival Ford over claims it’s violated a trademarked driver-assist technology that’s used for hands-free features. Bloomberg reports that GM says it’s taking action to protect the Cruise and Super-Cruise brands after Ford renamed its Co-Pilot360 automated driving system as “Blue Cruise”. The report says that GM says talks to resolve the […]
Driverless start-up Aurora valued at $13 billion
The Amazon-backed driverless start-up Aurora is going to be publicly listed, valued at $13 billion, which is roughly £9.4 billion. An article on the Nasdaq website confirms it had agreed to merge with a Silicon Valley “blank cheque firm” backed by financiers Reid Hoffman and Mark Pincus. It says the deal with Reinvent Technology Partners […]
Passengers give positive feedback to driverless experience
97% of people who rode a driverless pod in Cambridge have told a survey they’d get on one again without hesitation. More than 300 passengers hopped on board the Aurrigo shuttles to take fully autonomous journeys around the University of Cambridge’s West of Cambridge site this summer – including transport minister Rachel Maclean MP. The […]
Toyota buys mapping company to boost driverless ambitions
Toyota subsidiary Woven Planet Holdings has bought CARMERA, an American-based spatial AI company, which “specialises in bringing next-generation road intelligence to automated mobility at scale”. CARMERA is planning to base its European operations in London. This is the second major deal for Woven Planet in North America, following the April 2021 announcement to acquire Level […]
Tesla gives over-the-air autonomous update
Tesla owners are now able to use their cars’ “Autopilot’s driver-assist” features on roads outside of highways, thanks to those who have purchased the option receiving an over-the-air upgrade of their software. However, Engineering and Technology (eandt.theiet.org) reports that the Tesla founder Elon Musk has stressed on Twitter that the software is still just in […]
ISO publishes first international safety standard for fully automated driving systems
ISO, the international organisation for standardisation has published its first set of standards for the safe operation of low-speed automated driving systems for operation on predefined routes. It says the document applies to automated driving system-dedicated vehicles nd can also be utilised by dual-mode vehicles where a human can drive some of the time. ISO […]
Hermes and Ford use ‘hidden’ drivers to trial autonomous delivery vans
The delivery company Hermes and vehicle maker Ford are teaming up to conduct trials with ‘hidden’ drivers to help understand how people are likely to respond to autonomous delivery vehicles. The specially modified Ford Transit features a number of sensors designed to mimic the look of a fully self-driving vehicle, while a ‘human car seat’ […]
Vodafone and AWS technology tie-up delivers autonomous boost for Aurrigo
The driverless pod maker Aurrigo has announced that it has become one of the first companies in the UK to benefit from a new technology partnership between Vodafone and Amazon Web Services (AWS). The autonomous vehicle specialist has been powering its three Auto-Shuttles – used in the recent trials on roads in Cambridge. It says the […]
Driverless trucks in successful Hamburg trial
The port of Hamburg and a Munich-based lorry maker have announced they have successfully tested a driverless truck travelling in mixed traffic. The test happened at the Hamberger Hafen und Logistik AG Container Terminal Altenwerder as part of a research project aiming to develop automation solutions for road transport, focussing on customer-specific deployment and the […]
TRL to launch Connected and Automated Safety Assurance Tool to enable rapid scale-up of CAM trials
TRL has developed a new online software tool to simplify and streamline the approach to safety assurance of Connected and Automated Mobility trialling. It says this paves the way for rapid-scale up and repeat deployment of CAM trials in multiple locations. TRL says trials of CAM vehicle technologies are expensive and time-consuming to organise. Ensuring […]