Mobileye, BMW, Intel: Automated cars by 2021
First ‘hands off,’ then ‘eyes off,’ then ‘mind off ’ driving the goal, partners say
BMW Group, Intel and the Jerusalem-headquartered Mobileye are joining forces to make self-driving vehicles and future mobility concepts a reality, the companies announced at BMW Group Headquarters in Munich on Friday.
The three leaders from the automotive, technology and computer vision and machine learning industries are collaborating to bring solutions for highly and fully automated driving into series production by 2021.
“The future of automated driving promises to change lives and societies for the better, but the path to get to a fully autonomous world is complex and will require end-to-end solutions that integrate intelligence across the network, from door locks to the data center,” a joint statement said. “Transportation providers of the future must harness rapidly evolving technologies, collaborate with totally new partners, and prepare for disruptive opportunities.”
Together with Intel and Mobileye, the BMW Group aim to develop the necessary systems for highly and fully automated driving to bring these technologies into series production by 2021. The BMW iNEXT model will be the foundation for BMW Group’s autonomous driving strategy and set the basis for fleets of fully autonomous vehicles, not only on highways but also in urban environments for the purpose of automated ridesharing solutions, the partners said.
BMW Group, Intel and Mobileye said automated driving technologies will make travel safer and easier. The goal is to develop solutions that enable the drivers to not only take their hands off the steering wheel, but reach the so called “eyes off” (level 3) and ultimately the “mind off” (level 4) level, transforming the driver’s in-car time into leisure or work time, they said. This level of autonomy would enable the vehicle, on a technical level, to achieve the final stage of traveling “driver off” (level 5) without a human driver inside. This establishes the opportunity for self-driving fleets by 2021 and lays the foundation for entirely new business models, they continued.
The common platform will address level 3 to level 5 automated driving and will be made available to multiple car vendors and other industries who could benefit from autonomous machines and deep machine learning, the partners said.
The companies have agreed to a set of deliverables and milestones to deliver fully autonomous cars based on a common reference architecture. Near term, the companies aim to demonstrate an autonomous test drive with a highly automated driving (HAD) prototype. In 2017 the platform is to extend to fleets with extended autonomous test drives.
“Today marks an important milestone for the automotive industry as we enter a world of new mobility. Together with BMW Group and Intel, Mobileye is laying the groundwork for the technology of future mobility that enables fully autonomous driving to become a reality within the next few years,” said Mobileye co-founder, chairman and CTO Prof. Amnon Shashua. “Mobileye is proud to contribute our expertise in sensing, localization, and driver policy to enable fully autonomous driving in this cooperation. The processing of sensing, like our capabilities to understand the driving scene through a single camera already, will be deployed on Mobileye’s latest system-on-chip, the Eye Q ®5, and the collaborative development of fusion algorithms will be deployed on Intel computing platforms.
In addition, Mobileye Road Experience Management technology will provide real-time precise localization and model the driving scene to essentially support fully autonomous driving.”
Mobileye’s headquarters and R&D center are located in the capital’s Har Hotzvim Technology Park.
Intel CEO Brian Krzanich said, “Highly autonomous cars and everything they connect to will require powerful and reliable electronic brains to make them smart enough to navigate traffic and avoid accidents.”
The BMW Group has developed its framework to remain the driving force behind premium individual mobility. This approach will become driving reality with the BMW iNEXT model in 2021, heralding a new era of mobility.
Harald Krüger, chairman of the board of BMW AG, said, “Following our investment in high definition live map technology at HERE, the combined expertise of Intel, Mobileye and the BMW Group will deliver the next core building block to bring fully automated driving technology to the street. We have already showcased such groundbreaking solutions in our VISION NEXT 100 vehicle concepts. With this technological leap forward, we are offering our customers a whole new level of sheer driving pleasure whilst pioneering new concepts for premium mobility.”