One Step Closer to Autonomous Vehicles

Fully autonomous vehicles are one step closer to arriving on the UK’s streets, thanks to the latest round of ground-breaking research from MOVE_UK. The consortium, led by Bosch, has completed the first phase in its three-year research programme, designed to accelerate the development of automated driving systems and make them intelligent and safe enough for the UK’s roads.

Business and Energy Secretary Greg Clark has stated: “Low carbon and self-driving vehicles are the future and the UK is determined to be one of the leaders in this technological revolution. Through our Industrial Strategy, the Government is laying the foundations to ensure the UK seizes the opportunities presented by the development of our next generation of vehicles.

The project’s data is gathered from sensors installed on a fleet of Land Rover vehicles that have so far completed more than 30,000 miles of driving on public roads in Greenwich by council workers from their fleet services department. As part of the new validation method, data is selected and recorded intelligently which helps to reduce the total volume of data collected and speed up validation of the automated driving functions in the real world. The data is then automatically transferred to a central cloud, allowing researchers to analyse it remotely, using newly developed tools. As a result, the consortium partners are able to analyse how automated driving functions respond in the real world, helping to ensure that future autonomous vehicles drive in a natural way, retaining the positive driving characteristics of a good driver.

The next two phases of the project will see additional sensors added to the test vehicles, so by the end of the project the data gathered will be from full 360-degree surround sensing.

Key Points:

  • First phase of real-world testing establishes new validation method for future automated driving technologies
  • New validation method will reduce introduction time of highly automated driving technologies
  • Results to shape new safety requirements and insurance products designed for autonomous driving
  • Autonomy is evolutionary, not revolutionary - next generation of autonomous cars will look and drive like normal cars

Full details can be found here.

For further information please contact your local FPS representative.