The road to autonomous vehicles and its challenges

Whether you like it or not, autonomous vehicles (AVs) are coming to our world. Although it excites many, the evolution to self-driving cars is also facing push back and this is mainly due to the fear of crashing. So how do we make the transition in the smoothest way?

There are three main challenges to achieving an autonomous future, according to Moran David (pictured) who is General Manager for Mobileye’s Intelligent Mobility Solutions Division in North America.

Mobileye, an Intel company, offers vision-based advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) which provide real-time alerts for collision prevention, a technology used in the semi-autonomous vehicles of today.

“First of all, consumers must be able to trust full autonomy – which will require that they first grow familiar with and trust ADAS solutions. Autonomous vehicles will not be going mainstream tomorrow, but that doesn’t mean we have to wait to advance road safety,” Mr. David told Global Fleet.

Mobileye’s ADAS solutions are already leveraging the same technologies needed for self-driving safety and they aren’t only accessible in new vehicles. The company has solutions like Mobileye 8 Connect which can be retrofit to cars currently on roads.

Components of Mobileye 8 Connect (source: Mobileye)

Through such technologies, the company hopes that consumers will be able to see full autonomy as a natural next step in functionality, as opposed to something that requires a giant leap of faith. As such, it is helping the industry collectively forge a universal definition for what it means for a machine to drive safely.

We continue to advocate for technology leaders, automakers and government bodies to collaborate and establish a methodology and standard for the assessment and verification of an AV to drive safely, said the executive.

Secondly, “economic scalability remains another challenge for AVs,” says Mr. David. The costs of producing a self-driving car today would be too high to be accessible for mass markets. Geographic scale for ultra-precise maps would also be necessary to enable autonomous vehicles to operate everywhere.

Technology, mapping and economies of scale, however, are improving and these types of vehicles will be more accessible in the years to come.

Finally, “full autonomy cannot be realized without regulatory bodies and the technology reaching an equilibrium,” says the executive.

For now, to solve the challenges of cost, scale and regulation, part of Mobileye’s focus is on Mobility-as-a-Service, with plans to launch global robo-taxi rideshare services that will help pave the way to personal driverless cars of the future.