It seems that barely a day goes by without news of a tech company teaming up with the auto industry to advance the art of self-driving vehicles. On Tuesday, it was Nvidia and Bosch's turn. In an announcement at Bosch Connected World in Berlin, Germany, the two companies revealed that they are collaborating on an onboard computer capable of running the AI necessary for self-driving.
Based on Nvidia's Drive PX technology—which also powers semi-autonomous Teslas—the Bosch will also use Nvidia's forthcoming "Xavier" AI system-on-chip. Nvidia says that Xavier is capable of 20 trillion operations per second while drawing just 20 watts of power, meaning the Bosch car computer should be smaller and cheaper than Nvidia's current Drive PX 2 unit.
"We want automated driving to be possible in every situation. As early as the next decade, driverless cars will also be a part of everyday life. Bosch is advancing automated driving on all technological fronts. We aim to assume a leading role in the field of artificial intelligence, too," Bosch CEO Dr. Volkmar Denner said in a statement.
"Self-driving cars is a challenge that can finally be solved with recent breakthroughs in deep learning and artificial intelligence," said Jen-Hsun Huang, Nvidia's founder and CEO. "Using DRIVE PX AI car computer, Bosch will build automotive-grade systems for the mass production of autonomous cars."
However, it will be some time before any of us are being driven around by cars powered by this collaboration; production is expected "by the beginning of the next decade," according to Bosch.
reader comments
65