US drivers still not confident about prospect of self-driving cars

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A new report from the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute (UMTRI) has found that among US drivers their preference is for vehicles with no self-driving capability.

The research follows a similar UMTRI study from July last year which argued only 15% of 505 respondents would be happy with completely self-driving cars. This time around, with responses from 618 US drivers, the numbers are similar; again, 15% say they would be happy with self-driving cars, compared to 38%...

By James Bourne, 23 May 2016, 0 comments. Categories: Driverless.

Why Google is hiring test drivers for its driverless cars project

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Google is hiring test drivers for its self-driving cars project in Arizona to monitor software systems and provide feedback to the firm’s engineering teams.

The job ad, which can be found here, promises work on “cutting edge technology” and requires successful candidates to “develop a unique set of operational skills using vehicles running proprietary software and hardware.” The drivers will work in teams with one of them in the passenger seat taking notes...

By Connected CarTech, 16 May 2016, 0 comments. Categories: Driverless.

Samsung creates autonomous car chip team

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Rumours claim South Korean giant Samsung has set up a dedicated team to make chips for self-driving cars.

According to recent speculation, technology giant Samsung has created an in-house, dedicated team to manufacture processor chips to power self-driving cars. The company has long been manufacturing their own processors and the devices that they power, but...

By Connected CarTech, 12 May 2016, 0 comments. Categories: Driverless.

Law firms launch autonomous car teams

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Michigan law firms are carving teams out of their automotive practices, dedicated to autonomous and connected vehicles. The pioneering laws firms include Miller, Canfield, Paddock and Stone (Detroit) and Butzel Long (Ann Arbor), both of whom have been representing automotive clients for several years.

According to Jennifer Dukarski, a part of this team of attorneys at Butzel Long,...

By Connected CarTech, 09 May 2016, 0 comments. Categories: Driverless, Insurance, Regulation.

SMRT Services and 2getthere form Asia Pacific driverless car venture

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As automakers across the globe work on developing driverless car technology for use at the end of the decade, SMRT Services and 2getthere have formed a joint venture to commercialise 2getthere’s Automated Vehicle systems in the Asia-Pacific region.

The new Singapore-based JV, called 2getthere Asia, will market, install, operate and maintain the Automated Vehicle systems for customers in Singapore and the Asia-Pacific. The entity will put on display 2getthere’s third-generation...

By Connected CarTech, 29 April 2016, 0 comments. Categories: Driverless.

Toyota aims to make Ann Arbor “world’s largest connected car proving ground”

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Toyota has announced it is partnering with the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute (UMTRI) to transform Ann Arbor's streets into a real-world connected car deployment.

The Ann Arbor Connected Vehicle Test Environment (AACVTE) will serve as a real-world test environment for implementing connected vehicle safety technology that allows wireless communication of vehicles with other similar vehicles and portions of infrastructure such as traffic lights. These...

By Connected CarTech, 19 April 2016, 0 comments. Categories: Driverless, Ecosystems.

Google’s latest patent aims to help driverless cars better understand humans

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We have all seen humorous videos of what a world fully consisting of driverless cars will look like. It’s fascinating as well as somewhat hair-raising seeing cars manoeuvring through swarm intelligence systems and missing each other by inches at high speed.

The latest patent from Google aims to take this a step further, by aiming to help its fleet of driverless cars better understand other cars’ turning signals.

The patent, which can be seen in full

By James Bourne, 13 April 2016, 0 comments. Categories: Driverless.

England tentatively pushes further towards testing driverless cars

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Highways England, the arbiter for road network infrastructure in England, has unveiled a wide-ranging plan including opportunities for driverless cars and Internet of Things (IoT) technology.

Among the initial projects to be funded, according to the report, includes motorway to motorway traffic management schemes, as well as a ‘collaborative traffic management’ programme on the M25, as part of wider plans to make the road network and vehicles safer.

“We will pursue a...

By James Bourne, 07 April 2016, 0 comments. Categories: Driverless, Swarm.

Why the utopian vision of driverless cars is still a very long way off

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The race to bring driverless cars to our roads is in full swing. The automotive and technology industries are vying to be the first to market, while Google will tell you that it has driverless cars and that this technology is already possible. This may be the case on a smaller scale for cars that are connected on a Google metro, but this cannot yet be reflected on a mainstream level.

To make the driverless car a reality for the mass market, we need to understand how sensors, compute, and...

By Ricky Cooper, 21 March 2016, 0 comments. Categories: Connectivity, Driverless.

The self driving car crashes: Who is at fault?

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Self-driving cars are the wave of the future - at least, that’s what every technology publication seems to be saying these days, and honestly, it’s tough to argue with the idea. Many experts believe self-driving cars could become a common sight on the roads in as little as five years. Some are pushing off their predictions to 10 or 15 years down the line, but they all seem to agree that self-driving cars will become a permanent fixture at some...

By Rick Delgado, 15 March 2016, 1 comment. Categories: Driverless, Regulation, Security.