New Vision Tech for Heavy Goods AVs

Greg Hyde

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20th September 2018

A technology company has unveiled a new camera-based visual awareness system for Level 4 autonomous truck driving.

TuSimple claims the tech is the first of its kind, as it offers autonomous trucks the ability “to see and interpret objects up to 1,000 meters” ahead. It claims this represents a new “benchmark” for the AV sector, and will enable “the safe deployment and commercialization of autonomous trucks”. The company says it has already deployed the system on its own fleet of Peterbilt commercial autonomous semi-trucks.

The system is apparently based on the application of deep learning that was developed in cooperation with Amazon Web Services (AWS). Sensor fusion technology is used to draw environmental information from the cameras which act as the system’s primary sensors. TuSimple claims that as a result, it can interpret the vehicle’s visible environs from up to 1km away down to a single pixel, and be able to locate itself within four inches’ driving time.

Discussing the new system, TuSimple chief technology officer Dr Xiaodi Hou said: “Intensive training of autonomous vehicle software is critical to the success of all autonomous vehicles but even more so for the Class 8 tractor-trailers that haul freight 24/7 on our highways … we generated 20M miles of testing and terabytes a day testing our software on AWS’ platform to ensure our system makes the most informed and safest decisions possible while driving”.