Autonomous cars for individuals and families have long been a sci-fi dream idea inching closer and closer to a twenty-first century reality. But recent news articles suggest that some of the most progress on automated driving is not happening on the consumer market, but in the business of transportation and delivery — the logistics of getting goods to people. Think about how much materiel is shipped or driven to Mount Holyoke daily — from food to paper products. How would that change if the goods we need arrived via driverless vehicles? Would we be able to improve our efficiency as an institution?
In Arizona, Wal-mart is testing out the delivery of consumer goods via driverless van. One of the most interesting things about this particular project to me is that the company that made the car, Udelv, is using an open-source self-driving platform developed by a Chinese search engine. Interested readers might wish to delve into the details of Baidu’s platform and dig into what other companies are making use of Apollo to develop autonomous driving and delivery services.
At the same time, across the world in Germany, Daimler is starting to roll out semi-autonomous semi trucks. Other companies have announced their intent to build driverless long-haul trucks, or have begun to build prototypes, but some of the first players in the market have dialed back expectations and Daimler has taken up the cause, refining their initial prototype and getting a step closer to coming to market.
Could a completely driverless logistics chain – from warehouse to consumer – soon be a global phenomenon? One thing that’s really interesting to me is just how widespread this effort is. I bet our roads will look a little different in ten years.