A new study from China has concluded that self-driving could reduce both emissions and energy consumption by more than 60%, potentially increasing to 76% if combined with vehicle electrification.
Discovered as part of our pledge to focus more on the environmental impacts of self-driving, the “Energy and environmental impacts of shared autonomous vehicles (SAVs) under different pricing strategies” paper was published by Nature in February, in partnership with the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT).
Self-driving emissions reduction
Designed to help transport authorities gain a deeper understanding of future trends, the report’s lead author was Dr Shaopeng Zhong, of Dalian University of Technology.
“The introduction of vehicle automation, shared mobility, and vehicle electrification will bring about changes in urban transportation, land use, energy, and the environment,” it begins.
“However, existing research on estimating the energy and environmental effects of shared autonomous electric vehicles generally ignores the interaction between land-use and transportation systems.
“Under an appropriate pricing strategy, SAV deployment could reduce particulate matter emission and energy consumption by 56–64% and 53–61%, respectively. With the further introduction of vehicle electrification, these can rise to 76% and 74%.”
Double-edged sword
The report goes on to describe SAVs as a double-edged sword, because “On the one hand, SAVs can save energy and reduce emissions by, for example, promoting transportation efficiency, increasing road capacity, mitigating congestion, reducing accident frequency, matching vehicle sizes to trip requirements and eco-driving.
“On the other hand, SAVs can lower people’s marginal travel costs and make the locational decisions of residents and enterprises more free, leading to urban sprawl and increased travel time, distance, and frequency.”
The team therefore compared various SAV development scenarios for Jiangyin, a region of China at the forefront of self-driving, before concluding that: “An appropriate SAV fare can play an integral part in promoting sustainable development. Pricing policy will affect public acceptance of SAVs and is also an important means of realising effective SAV.”
Neil Kennett MOVE 2023 event review – self-driving, software-defined, clean fuel and more…
MOVE, “The world’s most important urban mobility event”, returned to London last week with two action packed days at the ExCeL centre.
As well as moderating the software defined vehicle panel, and seeing a vast array of amazing new self-driving-related tech from established multinationals and innovative start-ups, it was my pleasure to host the morning session on the Autonomous Vehicles stage.
MOVE Pledge 2023
Let’s start with my #MOVE2023 pledge. The organisers ask all speakers to make “a concrete pledge towards safer, smarter and more sustainable mobility”, for which we can be held accountable at next year’s event. In this pre-event piece I mused that I might just repeat my pledge from last year. Actually, I didn’t.
My all-new MOVE pledge for this year is two-fold: To encourage people to read David Attenborough’s bestselling book – A Life on Our Planet – which is brilliant and quite scary; and to focus more on the environmental impacts of self-driving – an under-researched area with competing theories – some highly negative, some highly positive.
Neil Kennett #MOVE2023 self-driving pledge
It is designed to remind myself (and you) that it is up to us to bring about the changes essential to avert ecological disaster. Taking my own advice, I met up with Jessica Battle, senior expert in global ocean policy and lead on the No Deep Seabed Mining Initiative at the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) – watch this space.
Self-driving stage
Our first speaker in Theatre 2 was Mark Cracknell, of Zenzic, who focussed on the role of SMEs in the connected and automated mobility ecosystem. He highlighted the world-leading projects funded via CCAV’s Commercialising CAM competition, asserting that no other country will have a greater breadth of self-driving services on the road by 2025.
It was standing room only for our next speaker, Dr Joanna White, Roads Development Director at National Highways, who set out plans to future-proof the UK’s road network for AVs. She highlighted the success of the HumanDrive project, and the fantastically-named Connected and Autonomous Vehicles: Infrastructure Appraisal Readiness (CAVIAR) project.
Dr Joanna White, of National Highways, at #MOVE2023
The first panel of the day saw Zeina Nazer, of Cities Forum, discussing new strategies for the safe deployment of ADAS and autonomous tech with Dr Nick Reed, in his role as chief road safety advisor to National Highways, and The Law Commission’s Nicholas Paines QC.
Paines noted that the three-year review of legislation to enable the deployment of automated vehicles on British roads was the first time the Commission had been asked to design a law for the future.
In response to a question from the audience, he also clarified that data protection was excluded from the terms of reference, instead being covered by GDPR.
They went on to cover the potential role of remote driving and the importance of public acceptance, with Reed highlighting the Vision Zero strategy to eliminate all traffic fatalities and severe injuries.
Jayesh Jagasia, of the AI in Automotive podcast, then took over hosting, including introducing the aforementioned “Embracing the SDV: Welcome to life in the software defined lane” panel.
Moderated by my good self, it featured: Patrick Blume, Head of Product for Urban Mobility at Mercedes-Benz; John Wall, Senior Vice-President at BlackBerry and head of its QNX system; and Marcus Welz, Vice President of Smart Mobility at Hyundai Motor Europe. A pertinent fact is that BlackBerry QNX is now embedded in over 235 million vehicles worldwide.
We only had 25 minutes, but we crammed a lot in, delving into cybersecurity, common codebase, OTA updates, verification and validation, changing car sales models, in-car personalisation, smart city connectivity, MAAS, ADAS and self-driving.
Serious points included Wall outlining the ability to refresh cars already on the road, the huge investments in what Blume described as the race for a competitive advantage, and Welz revealing an initiative to encourage Hyundai staff into multi-modal transport. Now that’s progressive!
Lighter moments included Welz describing the shift to self-driving as “a transition to The Jetsons”
We ended on the ability of near-future software-defined vehicles to reduce road traffic collisions, and therefore RTC fatalities and injuries, by up to 80% – oft-quoted maybe, but impressive, game-changing and thoroughly commendable nonetheless. My thanks to Max Kadera of MOVE and Lee the sound guy.
With moderating duties duly performed, I headed out into the arena, catching up with contacts old and new – Barbara Fitzsimons of Zenzic, Gunny Dhadyalla of AESIN, Karla Jakeman of TRL, Nick Fleming of BSI, Ben Loewenstein of Waymo and the IMI’s Mark Armitage.
ACES opinions
As IMI CEO Steve Nash noted: “MOVE represents the entire ACES (autonomous, connected, electric and shared) piece. You turn up with one opinion and have to moderate it after listening to all the different speakers.”
There were big eye-catching displays by business electric car subscription firm EZoo, ZF – with its Araiv Shuttle, powered by Oxa (formerly Oxbotica) – and HGV manufacturer Hydrogen Vehicle Systems. HVS are apparently talking to Fusion Processing (of CAVForth fame) about software – you heard it here first!
Hydrogen Vehicle Systems (HVS) at #MOVE2023
Further intriguing snippets included Teragence CEO Christian Rouffaert on their mobile connectivity data, Alex Bainbridge of Autoura on expansion in the US, Amir Tirosh of StoreDot on how their new EV fast charging delivers consistently better quality in record time, Sandip Gangakhedkar of Fetch on the expansion of their remote driving car delivery trial – now open to the public across Milton Keynes – and Dr Martin Dürr, of Dromos, on talks with city authorities around the world, particularly in the UK and US.
We’re already looking forward to #MOVE2024, at ExCeL again, on 19-20 June next year. In the meantime, we have our own event planned…
Our Cars of the Future flyer for #MOVE2023 mentioned a self-driving event…
BSI’s Nick Fleming and technical author Dr Nick Reed on the new Connected and Automated Mobility (CAM) Vocabulary.
If, as La Dolce Vita filmmaker Federico Fellini put it, a different language is a different vision of life, then BSI’s CAM (Connected and Automated Mobility) Vocabulary can make a vital contribution to the introduction of self-driving vehicles.
Sponsored by the UK Government’s Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CCAV), the latest edition, BSI Flex 1890 v5.0, was launched in April 2023. It includes 103 key definitions and 60 commonly used abbreviations.
We spoke to Nick Fleming, Associate Director at BSI (British Standards Institution) – the UK National Standards Body – and the vocabulary’s technical author Dr Nick Reed, of Reed Mobility, to find out more.
CAM experts: Nick Fleming of BSI and Nick Reed of Reed Mobility
On the title, why the shift from CAV to CAM?
NF: “This is the fifth iteration of the Vocabulary we launched in 2020, and it has evolved significantly. By amending the title from CAV to CAM (along with the whole standards programme that BSI is developing with UK government’s CCAV), we are recognising that connected and automated vehicles will exist within a broader transport ecosystem.
“It’s not about looking at self-driving vehicles in isolation. The technologies will be core to a range of future mobility solutions – private vehicles, light passenger services and commercial freight. These will combine to offer the potential to make our transport system more efficient, which can deliver more inclusive and sustainable mobility. Safety is paramount. CAM is where the industry is headed and standards will take that wider viewpoint.”
NR: “Exactly right. CAM better aligns with what the industry is now doing. There’s the Zenzic CAM Roadmap, the government response to the Law Commission used CAM. It presents a strong picture of how the UK is positioning itself, how this technology is going to have such a positive impact on communities and businesses.”
What were the other most interesting changes?
NR: “There was a big expansion in the number of terms in version four, so we’ve rationalised and sharpened the definitions. The beauty of the BSI Flex process is that it allows this kind of rapid evolution – the ability to look back six months on, to update or amend as technologies mature. For example, there have been significant developments in the remote driving arena, so we’ve improved those definitions and removed terms we felt were confusing.
“One definition I particularly like is automated driving. It’s very simple now. Automated driving is when the dynamic driving task is performed by the automated driving system. That’s it. There are notes to help the reader understand exactly what we mean, but that’s a really clear definition of what is, and, just as important, what isn’t, automated driving.
“We’ve removed terms like Software Development Kit and Real Time Kinematics, that weren’t adding much value in a CAM context, and we’ve added helpful terms from other standards, like Static Entity and Dynamic Entity.
“Putting the Vocab together is interesting and challenging, with the technical advisory group including people from academia and the public and private sectors. One day we’ll reach an asymptote where much of the technology is standardised, but we’re not there yet. You only need to look at the media coverage of Ford’s hands-free announcement to see that there’s a lot of work still to do.
“These technologies are evolving rapidly, which is why the Vocab is so important – to help the industry reach that consistency of language. It’s great that government and others see the value, for example, when Innovate UK specified use of it for their Commercialising CAM competition.”
NF: “Dr Reed and the advisory group that worked with BSI to develop and maintain the vocabulary have done a fantastic job when considering work on related policy activities, like the Law Commission’s work on remote driving, during the process of updating the vocab. If the language isn’t right, or if there’s huge variation, it can cause confusion. Clarity can help to build public confidence in a technology that has the opportunity to bring benefit to society, if trust is there.
“It’s not easy to arrive at succinct definitions that everyone’s comfortable with. It requires a lot of consensus building. That’s fundamental to the BSI process. Language is the building block of standards, and we constantly strive to arrive at common acceptance. We know the Vocab has been accessed by companies and authorities the world over – that shows its relevance.”
What role does the Vocab play in BSI’s CAM Standards programme?
NF: “This Vocabulary is fundamental to our wider CAM programme. It was the first standard developed through BSI’s Flex process, which has now been adopted across BSI. We’re increasingly finding, especially in areas of emerging technologies, the value of developing standards in a more agile way – to be able to make changes more frequently. That’s positive from a perspective of informing and supporting regulatory development. Standards work well when they are a common touch point for industry, academia and consumers.
“The industry has been on a bit of a journey, moving from autonomous to automated vehicles, and increasingly we’re now talking about self-driving. We’ll soon be starting work on new standards relating to remote operation of vehicles, including remote driving, looking at both the technical system requirements and, crucially, the human factors element. The technology can be used as a fallback capability for self-driving vehicles, and for vehicles with more limited automation – to deliver and collect lease vehicles, for instance.
“Over the next few years, we’ll be looking at standards focused on the testing and validation of self-driving technologies – thinking about cybersecurity and what good operational safety looks like. Standards can help to ensure that the transition from advanced trials to commercial deployment happens safely, bringing all the societal benefits to life.”
NR: “There’s a lot of hype around AI at the moment – how it produces good answers most of the time, but sometimes answers that are either incorrect or unexpected. When we’re talking about safety critical systems for drivers, passengers and other road users, we need to have that sense of assurance that they will do the right things at the right time, reliably and acceptably. The Vocab provides a strong basis for what the Secretary of State for Transport is likely to be considering when listing a vehicle as self-driving.”
For a free copy of the CAM Vocabulary click here and there’s an option to provide feedback via the red “Read draft and comment” button.
Self-driving on track in 1967 feat. BBC Archive footage of an amazing connected, automated, shared and electric vehicle.
As regular Cars of the Future readers will know, we occasionally like to look back in a series we call… Cars of the Past. Well, today is one of those days.
Following last year’s release of a 1971 news broadcast on “driverless cars and the future of motoring”, the BBC Archive has published another great Retro Transport report: “The Self-Driving Car Of Tomorrow”, from 1967.
The “dual-mode” Self-Transport Road and Rail Car (staRRcar), was designed by Harvard graduate William Alden in the 1960s.
The report describes it as “America’s answer to the universal problem of personal transport in congested cities – combining the door-to-door convenience of the private car with the speed and relaxation of public transport at its best.”
Self-driving on track
The battery-powered three-seater can be driven ‘normally’ on local roads, but also has the ability to join automated guideways – 8ft-wide tracks designed to be installed alongside existing road lanes.
Self-driving on track in 1967: Alden staRRcar
Users simply press a button to select their destination, sit back and read the paper, while the staRRcar slots into a train of such vehicles, self-driving at up to 60mph.
After taking a spur exit, they can retake control and continue their journey, or leave the staRRcar at a car park, ready to be used by others.
Congratulations to all involved in the CAVForth project. The UK’s first self-driving bus service (with a safety driver) is up and running – operating, according to the Stagecoach Bus website, a “frequent timetable from Monday 15th May with the capacity for around 10,000 passenger journeys per week”.
Officially still a trial, a fleet of five Alexander Dennis Enviro200AV buses will travel at up to 50mph from Ferrytoll Park & Ride in Fife to Edinburgh Park Transport Interchange – crossing the iconic Forth Road Bridge.
Self-driving success
When we interviewed Jim Hutchinson, CEO of Fusion Processing – the company behind the CAVstar software platform – back in 2021, he predicted that CAVForth would put the UK on the self-driving map. And it has.
Scotland’s Transport Minister, Kevin Stewart, and Ray O’Toole, Executive Chairman for Stagecoach, were among those at the media launch, with David Webb, Head of Innovation at the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CCAV), heralding it “a global first”.
The local Dunfermline Press carried this great video of CAVForth in action.
CAVForth self-driving bus
Future expansion
What next? In February, we reported that CAVForth2 had won a healthy share of £81m in combined government and industry funding in the Commercialising Connected and Automated Mobility competition.
Alexander Dennis have confirmed that the project will extend the existing 14-mile route, taking it on to Dunfermline city centre. The additional five-mile section will feature more complex driving scenarios on busy A and B roads, including mixing with city centre traffic.
We still have the words of Jim Hutchinson ringing in our ears: “We developed the CAVstar platform as a scalable solution – a drive system we could put into pretty much any vehicle, from small cars up to HGV.”
Pictured L-R: Jim Hutchinson, CEO Fusion, Scottish Transport Minister, Kevin Stewart, Regional Director Stagecoach, Sam Greer, and Alexander Dennis President and Managing Director, Paul Davies.
New self-driving consumer opinion survey identifies continuing negativity and gender and age divides.
A new survey by Go.Compare car insurance has found that 45% of the UK population don’t like the idea of autonomous vehicles, they are, apparently, “Not AV’ing it”.
What’s more, it found a gender divide too, with 26% of men actively liking the idea, compared to just 13% of women, and an age divide, with more younger Brits, 32% of 18-24-year-olds, keen on the idea.
Ryan Fulthorpe, of Go.Compare, said: “While we’re still a way off AVs being an everyday occurrence on UK roads, it appears that may actually suit a lot of motorists for the moment, as they’re not quite ready for this type of travel.
“It’s understandable that there’s some reluctance as the use of AVs has always seemed like a futuristic idea, but with Ford and Nissan both making significant in-roads with the technology, and other manufacturers undoubtedly looking to the future, it’s fast becoming a reality.
“However, if we want to promote mainstream adoption of this type of travel, the general public will understandably need to see more proof that the technology is sound and is a safe way to travel, as well as it having other benefits, such as easing congestion in cities.”
The most famous example in the ‘Ave it! genre is, of course, the John Smiths advert starring Peter Kaye’s no-nonsense approach to football training. Enjoy!
The legendary Peter Kaye John Smiths advert – ‘Ave it!
Dr Daniel Ruiz on self-driving, the internet of transport and more.
Non-executive director at the Office of Rail and Road (ORR), and reviewer of major projects for the Cabinet Office, Oxbridge engineering graduate Dr Daniel Ruiz has had a stellar 40-year career in public transport.
He was previously head of real-time operations at Transport for London (TfL), notably set up the Transport Coordination Centre for the 2012 Olympics, founded the Transport Technology Forum (TTF), and was head of Zenzic, tasked with accelerating self-driving in the UK.
We started by asking him about the hype surrounding self-driving cars…
DR: “Hype can be the enemy of progress. I think in connected and autonomous mobility (CAM), it’s certainly the case that hype held things back. People became interested in just driverless cars, and that narrow interest resulted in a focus on the wrong things – not the best outcomes for society, the economy or the environment.
“Robotaxis have long been the sex symbol of the autonomous vehicle parc, but they’re not necessarily going to make the biggest, or soonest, impact. There’s an emerging realisation that there are greater opportunities in autonomous freight.
“This is partly because freight doesn’t complain about how fast it goes around corners. It’s also because of the many off-highway opportunities for freight movements. This enables you to prove safety and efficacy.”
How do self-driving cars fit into the future of transport?
DR: “You can easily conclude that driverless technology is expensive, therefore it will only be for multimillionaires. The reality is that much of the technology has been proven on buses and low speed shuttles – public transport services. These are going to proliferate much faster than private autonomous vehicles, not least because the regulations still need to be established.
“The driverless car that sits in your own garage is a bit of a distraction because it reflects the current transport paradigm – take one thing out, a driven car, and put something else in, a driverless car. It implies that everything else remains the same.
“We need to be thinking in more dimensions about what we want in terms of mobility. To deliver the ultimate transport system you need to satisfy the collective requirements of society. There’s not enough looking forwards, then working back.
“Michael Hurwitz, formally Director of Transport Innovation at TfL, often draws attention to the fact that, until recently, there were very few modes of transport. Now there’s electric scooters and bikes, hire schemes, ride sharing and more.
“We need to put less emphasis on the mode and think more in terms of getting from A to B in the most efficient and comfortable way. Maybe you’d be happy to walk to a scooter station, get that to the train, then pick up a cab. It’s the dwell times that inject frustration and inefficiency; that lead many to say: “It’s too complicated, I’m going to jump in the car”.
“Autonomous vehicles are part of the equation, but the C in CAM, ‘connectivity’, is also vital. The Internet of Transport (IoT) is probably the most important thing to be considering right now. How do we make sure that data and knowledge are flowing safely, securely, anonymously? Then there’s the financial side – how do you charge for stuff?
“At one point the UK was ahead of the game, certainly amongst the front runners. It isn’t as obvious that we are today, but the prize is still there. Legislation is the blocker. We haven’t moved on from the 2018 Automated and Electric Vehicles Act, although the excellent Law Commission review has recently pointed the way.”
Finally, tell us about your new job at the ORR…
DR: “The ORR is the independent regulator for Britain’s railways, and also monitors the performance of the Strategic Road Network. It has proven itself to be one of the better regulators, trusted to do a job in everyone’s best interest, and this is a very exciting time for both rail and road.
“The ORR has an obvious focus on safety and value of money, but to do this we’re increasingly involved with data – how intelligence can be brought to bear on improving the flow of traffic and the movement of people and goods.”
Please note: a version of this article was first published by the Institute of the Motor Industry’s MotorPro magazine.
Profile: Delivers.ai – the London-based last-mile self-driving delivery specialist.
In this Cars of the Future exclusive, we talk last mile self-driving delivery robots with Michael Lacy, Chief Strategy Officer at Delivers.ai
In October, the London-based on-demand autonomous delivery service reached the final round of the Zenzic CAM Scale-Up selection process, with Programme Director Mark Cracknell praising “The quality and range of the finalists – testament to the innovative solutions that will make future mobility cleaner, safer and more efficient”.
Chief Strategy Officer
ML: “The market we’re targeting is last-mile for emission free, restaurant food, grocery and parcel delivery to the doorstep. Our robots work on camera-based technologies and low-cost sensors, travel at pedestrian speeds – up to about 6km/h – and, for safety, they give way to other pavement or cycleway users.
Michael Lacy, Chief Strategy Officer at self-driving delivery robot company Delivers.ai
“We’ve been in R&D for the last 2 years and are now working with partners right across Europe on various pilot schemes. We’ve recently had investment from Ford, which is really important to us. Our long-term view is that our platform will ultimately be device agnostic – in that there will be different types and sizes of robots relative to the use case.
“Our business model is solely B2B, so our initial target partners include multi-site restaurant and grocery groups as well as parcel delivery operators. We looked at the volumes and average weights of grocery deliveries and developed our robot to have this capability. It can take a 30kg payload, enough for a multiple-item 3-day shop, with internal volume dimensions designed to take a stack of 14-inch pizza boxes.
Self-driving vehicle or robot?
“In terms of hurdles, it is taking time for the governance to catch up to the technology. It’s difficult to get a definition from a government body as to what is a robot and differentiate it from what is a vehicle – it seems open to interpretation, with different authorities taking different views. Some of the more progressive, like Milton Keynes and Northampton, are very clear that ours is a device, not a vehicle
“Raising awareness is a big part of this – demonstrating robots in practical use to the public and authorities to let them know that the safety angle has been carefully considered and educating businesses and local providers about the benefits of these devices. Not least in terms of cost savings, but also the drive to net zero and the substantial impact such a service has for those with mobility issues. Organisations such as Zenzic are very helpful to us in this regard and we again hope to be part of the CAM Scale-up this year.
“We’re also looking at other routes to market, for example, operating on private land. We’re discussing a pilot in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London, as well as approaching various other universities and business parks.
“The more places we can operate, the more we can raise awareness and help people to understand that these robots are going to be helpful, the better. Much of our R&D is focused on safety, making sure that the robot behaves appropriately in relation to all kinds of challenges – from curious dogs to busy road crossings.”
Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has posted a great blog about the “surreal” experience of being driven around London in a self-driving Wayve.ai car with a safety driver.
“I give you credit for picking one of the most difficult situations I’ve seen,” he tells Wayve CEO Alex Kendall in this video:
Bill Gates posted this graphic on the SAE self-driving levels 1-5
“Right now, we’re close to the tipping point—between levels 2 and 3—when cars are becoming available that allow the driver to take their hands off the wheel and let the system drive in certain circumstances,” he says.
“Over the next decade, we’ll start to see more vehicles crossing this threshold. AVs are rapidly reaching the point where almost all of the technology required has been invented.
“As AVs become more common, we’re going to have to rethink many of the systems we’ve created to support driving. Car insurance is a great example.
“Governments will have to create new laws and regulations. Roads might even have to change. Will AVs eventually become so popular that you have to use the “human drivers only” lane if you want to be behind the wheel?”
On the Wayve test, he said: “The car drove us around downtown London, which is one of the most challenging driving environments imaginable, and it was a bit surreal to be in the car as it dodged all the traffic. (Since the car is still in development, we had a safety driver in the car just in case, and she assumed control several times.)”
In this Cars of the Future exclusive, we talk solid-state 360-degree radar, ADAS, self-driving and Zenzic success with Dr Kashif Siddiq, founder of Oxford RF Solutions.
How did you come up with the 360-degree radar idea?
KS: “We’ve specialised in radar and sensor technologies for 15 years, creating a lot of tech for other businesses. Then it struck us that there’s a huge gap in the market.
“The problem we see is people taking off-the-shelf sensors and bolting them to vehicles to try and make them autonomous. This probably isn’t the right way of doing it. What we need is sensors designed specifically for autonomous vehicles. That was the idea behind Oxford RF.
“We’ve developed a prototype which solves some of the burning challenges in perception sensors for ADAS and self-driving. It also has drone, space and marine applications. It is the world’s first solid-state 360-degree sensor. Actually, we’ve already taken it to the next level by making it hemispherical, so it can see upwards in a dome as well as all-round.
“There are no moving parts and we have the capability to integrate multiple technologies within the same box, but we’re focusing mainly on radar for now.”
Oxford RF and the APC
Oxford RF has been supported by the Advanced Propulsion Centre (APC) via its Technology Developer Accelerator Programme (TDAP), including collaboration with the Warwick Manufacturing Group (WMG).
Self-driving investment: Oxford RF has been supported by the Advanced Propulsion Centre
And won funding as one of 2022’s Zenzic CAM Scale-Up winners
KS: “We applied last year but at that stage we only had an idea rather than a technology to test. Now we have a working prototype and are really leading the thought process when it comes to perception sensing.
“The current situation with advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) is a mix of cameras, radars and lidars being used to effectively give a full 360-degree picture. There’s an architectural problem with this. First of all, the price.
“Each of those sensors is expensive and there’s so many of them. Then, obviously, all that data needs to be routed to a centralised computer, and that causes latency. Milliseconds are valuable when it comes to saving lives.
“Another issue is redundancy: what’s the backup if one sensor fails? All too often the answer is another sensor, which means yet more cost. And you start to run into the mutual interference problem.”
KS: “In a nutshell, we’ve reengineered sensor architecture. It doesn’t need to be radar, it can be any sensor. This allows us to reduce the sensor count.
“Initially we installed them on the car roof, but we’re moving them to the four corners, inside the bumpers. Less sensors means less latency in decision making, so it’s a faster system overall. It’s also inherently more resilient to interference.
“From a safety critical point of view, the four corners approach comes with redundancy built-in, because if one of the 360-degree sensors fails, two others are still looking at the same point.
“Delivering visibility in all conditions has to be seen as a deep tech problem and solved on a scientific basis. Are we able to reduce the mortality rate? That’s the real acid test.
“Further to that, from a finance point of view, can we reduce the cost of what I call the minimum viable sensor suite? Does that enable manufacturers to reduce car prices? Or insurers to reduce premiums due to less crashes?
ADAS first, then self-driving
KS: “We’re taking a beachhead approach and the first application will be ADAS. We’ll prove our technology there and then scale to full autonomy. Over the next year, we’re planning to produce about 100 of our solid-state 360-degree radars, to expand trials with our initial customers.
“We’re planning to start commercial production in 2024. From there, we’ll expand into other markets, as many as we practically can. For example, in drone applications, we’ll usually only need one sensor. For spacecraft, we’re looking at two front-facing sensors. For marine vessels, we’re talking about three sensors – one on the bow and two on the stern.
“It will take time to develop our business to a level where we can supply all of these markets, but it’s really good to see that there’s already significant interest.”
