You Might Not Have to Buy a New Vehicle

A college dropout from MIT is selling hardware to attach to any normal car. The hardware and software will - for only $7-10,000 - turn your car into a an automated vehicle. Now the article does not offer much in the way of detail, so this does not seem to be a total transformation to completely driverless operation, but it's pretty nifty nonetheless. 

Or, you can buy a 3D-printed car, but the price tag will be a bit steeper.

Driverless Everywhere in Three Years

This clip from Bloomberg News has a transportation industry commentator making a prediction that in three-years, there will be driverless passenger vehicleson the roads. Not as a test, but for us to use. He also has interesting things to say about the sharing economy and vehicle utilization.

Google goes weird
Austin's first TV coverage of the arrival of the Google car. Deregulated state + a liberal city = good place to test innovative technology. Really, nothing you have not seen already if you follow driverless car news.

And here is video coverage of the study this week from Lawrence Berkeley National laboratory about the tremendous emission reductions and efficiencies that driverless shared-use vehicles, called here robo-cabs, will bring. 

All About Partnerships

Who is dancing with whom?
University of Michigan to open driverless 32-acre testing grounds - fake city and suburban streets - this month, by late July. Consortium of car companies and technology companies involved. Not Google, not Uber.

By the way, at least one of the driverless cars heading to Michigan will be a 3D-printed vehicle from Local Motors. The company is also pairing up with other universities and companies.

General Motors and the University of North Carolina are teaming up to reduce the cost and improve the performance of driverless computer technology. The National Science Foundation will also be contributing. 

Predictions abound
I do not waste my time on the numerous predictions about the changes that driverless vehicles will bring or how many people will ride in them. This study caught my eye for its prediction that electric driverless taxis will result in a 90 percent reduction in automotive emissions.

And where are those Google cars? Not only in Mountain View, CA, and its environs. Google announced this week that its driverless cars are hitting the streets of Austin, TX. Perhaps a liberal, tech-friendly city in the de-regulated environment of the Lonestar state and is what attracted Google.

Totally Driverless - Uber v. Google

The competition to oust Google as the leader in the fully autonomous vehicle sweepstakes is heating up with Uber getting aggressive. Read this morning about Uber's Bing acquisition and what it means. Speculation all around that Uber's purchase of the Bing software engineers is part of reaching toward the great driverless plan to replace those pesky human driver employees, I mean "independent contractors."

Google's reasoning in going completely driverless is correct, in my opinion, and Chris Umson gives a nice driverless for dummies TED talk about Google's rationale and the technology that is making this leap possible. According to Umson, we humans are not the best drivers and thousands of us die each year as a result.

No Collision in Google/Delphi/Audi Near Miss

Out of all of the hoopla news coverage of the Google/Delphi/Audi near miss, the point made least frequently, but which is the most important point to drive home, is that no collision occurred. The Audi detected the other vehicle in the lane and it responded by not changing lanes. Spock-like logic, indeed. Humans are less likely to change course mid-moment. (This was a Delphi-controlled Audi vehicle.)

Last night, my friend's son was killed in a collision with a truck. A nice 24-year-old young man, full of promise. His brother is in the hospital. Funeral plans are being made. Hearts are breaking. If machines can drive better than we humans can, let us support this technological shift.

Down on the Driverless Farm

Yes, with fewer people, less regulation, and a big need for cost efficiency, farms in the US are going and, indeed, have already gone driverless. This article describes how farmers are laughing at the rest of us because we think of driverless as cutting edge, while for them a tractor without a human driving is old hat.

Google, Baidu Diverge on Driverless Plans

None of this is new. These are developments over the past month.

Google now going into car insurance business and its driverless vehicles are on the roads of Mountain View, CA. 

Tesla abandons Silicon Valley dream of totally driverless vehicles, opting instead for the incremental approach adopted by traditional car manufacturers.

Unlike the traditional car manufacturers, Tesla plans on launching a totally driverless vehicle in three years. The interim incremental approach will allow hands-free driving on the highway - but require eyes on the road. That seems so dangerous and definitely sleeo inducing. http://www.industryweek.com/emerging-technologies/tesla-autopilot-car-could-hit-road-weeks

No surprise here that China's tech sector is working on driverless vehicles. Baidu, described as the Chinese Google, is planning to have an autonomous vehicle on the road by the end of the year. However, the vehicle will be driver-assisted. Baidu has not announced plans for a driverless vehicle.
http://www.hybridcars.com/self-driving-car-being-built-by-chinas-google/