A Chinese Company Has Started Charging For Fully Driverless Rides (arstechnica.com) 24
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Baidu, China's leading search engine, is often compared to Google. And just as Google has spun off Waymo to commercialize self-driving technology, so Baidu is developing self-driving technology of its own. On Thursday, the Chinese search giant announced the launch of what it is calling China's first paid autonomous vehicle service, known as Apollo Go. Arguably, the service is better described as a shuttle service than a taxi service. Customers are picked up and dropped off from one of eight predefined stations. The initial service area is 2.7 square kilometers -- a little over one square mile. The longest route in the network is 5 km (3 miles). That makes the service a lot smaller than the Waymo One taxi service in Phoenix, which has a service area of around 50 square miles.
Still, there's little doubt that Baidu is one of China's leading self-driving companies -- and that China is the world's No. 2 market for self-driving technology after the United States. In total, Baidu is testing fully driverless vehicles in three Chinese cities and is testing its technology with safety drivers in more than two dozen cities. Baidu has even gotten permission to test fully driverless vehicles near its Silicon Valley offices in Sunnyvale. Another Chinese company, AutoX, has been testing fully driverless vehicles in Shenzhen since December. The service has been open to select members of the public since January, though AutoX hasn't started charging for rides. Several other Chinese companies are working on self-driving technology.
Still, there's little doubt that Baidu is one of China's leading self-driving companies -- and that China is the world's No. 2 market for self-driving technology after the United States. In total, Baidu is testing fully driverless vehicles in three Chinese cities and is testing its technology with safety drivers in more than two dozen cities. Baidu has even gotten permission to test fully driverless vehicles near its Silicon Valley offices in Sunnyvale. Another Chinese company, AutoX, has been testing fully driverless vehicles in Shenzhen since December. The service has been open to select members of the public since January, though AutoX hasn't started charging for rides. Several other Chinese companies are working on self-driving technology.
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Drinking our milk. (Score:2)
Our food is as described. [bloomberg.com] Discuss.
Re: Eating our lunch (Score:2)
They would rather buy your lunch, and they probably would if you weren't all such dicks about being #1 and had such paralysing national insecurity.
Non-story (Score:2)
Arguably, the service is better described as a shuttle service than a taxi service. Customers are picked up and dropped off from one of eight predefined stations.
The most difficult part of self-driving is navigating paths and locations that are not predefined specifically because of the obscene number of variations and unexpected events. This is little more than a trolley with a few extra sensors.
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More versatile than a trolley.
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Everything you say is true but the headline. This is still a significant development for the company in question.
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Re: Non-story (Score:1)
And these are popping up in many places in USA for a long time now
The name of that Chinese driverless company? (Score:2)
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China and Big Tech love driverless cars (Score:2)
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Maybe, but as our cyberpunk writers have pointed out the future will have hackers. Think of them as the people who disclose what's happening and how it's happening (Snowden, etc). They even tell one how to disable, or deceive. The bane of any spying society.
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Would you please repeat the destination? (Score:2)
Chines people (Score:1)
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